Comments on: Preserving the Zeitgeist

By: Iris

Iris — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 00:15:00 +0000

This is part of what I love about blogs. Random impossible ideas spark discussions that get me thinking about the nature of what I’m doing and how it fits into the bigger picture. It also reminded me (just when I needed that reminder) that there is value in keeping up that can never be replaced by catching up. The moment will have passed if I let things slide for a while and then catch up with my favorite blogs.

By: waltc

waltc — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 21:53:00 +0000

For some reason, this post has been on my mind--and I had enough to say about it that I've responded ("responded" may be the wrong word) in this post on Walt at Random.

By: Greg Schwartz

Greg Schwartz — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 03:25:00 +0000

I guess what I’m saying is that, if I go off and create another synthesis-oriented project of my own, what I’ve really done is create yet another contextual fragment that is then seen as something to be synthesized by the next person trying to synthesize the conversational context. And so on and so on in an endlessly recursive process. And maybe that’s all to the good, but it’s not how I’d go about it. Actually, it probably is exactly how I’d go about it, which is why I’m the one directly responsible for the Carnival and UnVocab. Huh.

By: Iris

Iris — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 22:51:00 +0000

I’m not sure that working on it in isolation “creates a deepening of the same problem,” but I do agree that an isolated effort here or there won’t do a whole lot to fix the problem. Not that it’s really a “problem” I suppose. I guess the wanna-be historian in me craves some way to catch moments rather than isolated streams. Which will always be impossible anyway since we interpret moments, and our interpretations are also subject to the moment. In lit-crit speak, moments are always already uncollectable. This doesn’t stop me wishing, though. :-)

By: Greg Schwartz

Greg Schwartz — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 14:06:00 +0000

I do ask for newsworthiness, because that seems the most straightforward, but what I'm really seeking are topical conversation starters. Actual newsworthiness is only one piece of that, albeit an important one.

Walt highlights the reason that Cites & Insights works and the Carnival didn't. C&I is the work of one truly impassioned (and perhaps strange, but likely not much stranger than me) individual.

A blog carnival is, by design, a community effort. Our community might not have been right for the kind of self-promotional instincts one has to have to submit to a blog carnival. Or perhaps I didn't try hard enough.

We never had a problem finding someone willing to do the editorial legwork on a weekly basis. The idea was to distribute that time and energy commitment, so that we didn't have to worry about people tiring of it. But it was the lack of wider community participation that killed it.

Uncontrolled Vocabulary survives because of a small group of people who make me feel like I'm not alone in my interest in the conversation. If it was just me, as it was with the original Open Stacks podcast, it would be an unsustainable model of loneliness for all but the strongest of wills (such as Walt's).

Point being that folks like Walt are few and far between and that, if our goal is to preserve zeitgeist, what we really need is a dedicated collaborative effort. People working on the problem in isolation just creates a deepening of the same problem of fragmented conversational context.

By: Iris

Iris — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 23:45:00 +0000

Yep, it's ok. I'm a sucker for seeing my writing show up in C&I, and even if I weren't, there's a handy CC license on this stuff.

By: waltc

waltc — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 23:01:00 +0000

Hmm. First, I think I meant coincidence rather than serendipity, although there’s a touch of serendipity as well.

Second–well, I’m quoting the whole post in the article I’m working on; hope that’s OK. It’s too cogent and tightly written to excerpt…

By: waltc

waltc — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 22:11:00 +0000

Interesting post (and always a delight to be used as an exemplar!)

A bit of serendipity: I hit this post just now because I was going to your blog to pick up elements of your November 17, 2008 post "Whatever happened to library blogs?"–as part of an article for C&I, or in this case a section of an article that talks about conversations and blogging… and, of course, now I'll include this post as well.

I'd forgotten about TWILBL, but the state of that and Carnival are indicators: Weaving these things together is actual work, and unless you're a little strange (like the proprietor of Cites & Insights), it may not be particularly rewarding work. The group of half a dozen library ezine/newsletter publishers that was briefly COWLZ is now down to…well, one.