The Flurry Blog

At the top left hand corner of every New York Times front page you will see the words “all the news that’s fit to print”.   A college professor  of mine Robert Sahr once pointed out  how ridiculous this statement was.  There is no possible way you could fit all the news worthy of print in a hundred papers, let alone into one.  Each news outlet chooses what stories to pursue. Fewer ones make it to print.  I love the New York Times, and I used to be a junkie.  But I began to find that I was increasingly being affected by the stories I was reading.  Did I really need to know about crime and mayhem around the world? Local papers and news outlets are even worse.  Turn on the 11 o’clock news anywhere in the US and you will soon be depressed.  Max Lucodo in his book Fearless tells about Frank Furedi’s study of the increased use of the word risk in British newspapers.  In 1994 risk appeared 2,037 times increasing to over 8,000 times in 2008. A psychologist friend once stated the obvious, “we can not as humans handle all the worlds bad news”.  So I have stopped watching, listening and reading.  I still need to know what is going on in my world.  -My WORLD-  is the key phrase.  That is why I like tools like Alltop.com, Twitter, Google Reader, and yes occasionally Facebook.  I can peruse these news sources -yes I did say sources- and find the news I need for the day.  Rather than going through a media source, where an editor picks my stories for me (and today for not such pure reasons) I can choose my own stories from people I trust. This has revolutionized how I digest news.

About a year and a half ago a friend told me that he does not read papers anymore or watch CNN.  It seemed odd at the time because I knew him to be someone who likes to keep up on current events.  He then went on to tell me that he gets all of his news from twitter.  If it is a story that his friends are talking about, he will click on their links and read for himself.  At the time I thought he was nuts, but I have now come to do the same.  I follow people in my network whom I trust.  Most of them have similar interests as me.  If they begin to talk about a story they will usually have a link associated with it for me to learn more.

Beyond this I have what I like to call my own personal newspaper using My Alltop.  It changes every day and the topics range from fly-fishing news to publishing news.  Alltop is one of many ways, and currently my favorite, for people to gather rss feeds into one place where they can digest all of it.  I like Alltop because it has the major blogs that I like most.  I can hover over a headline and easily see the first few lines of the article.  It is also a great way for me to answer people’s question “what blogs do you read.” With one link they are reading what I read.  Of course not all blogs are on Alltop, but they can easily be submitted.  I use Google reader for ones that are not on alltop. There I can also share my favorites with others.  The bottom line to all of this is we can now be back in control of what news we digest.  Instead of depending on an increasingly conglomerate run press for our information, we can search out our own sources.  That is priceless in today’s world.

You can create your own Alltop page here.

Popularity: 8% [?]

This is what I wrote on a co-post with Chris Nordyke on WeLoveCorvallis.com

I am not a member of a local chamber of commerce.  I do see the worth of new contacts and networking opportunities that my local chamber might offer me though.  I do think the chamber’s goals in helping business and community are essential.  My whole business is built around connecting with others and helping businesses connect with their communities.  So how do I see the mission of the chamber being fulfilled?  Well it is happening outside the chamber’s control.  The Communities they serve are going beyond what a program heavy chamber does.  Things have changed.  With social networking and the explosion of tools for our community to connect and engage we now are seeing spontaneous, organic community involvement like we have not seen in over 200 hundred years.

I witness every day something remarkable.  Business friends and community members see a need or opportunity and take it upon themselves to initiate change.  It did not take a new committee or a board’s approval.  Usually it only takes a quick phone call (usually now a direct message via twitter or facebook), a bit of collaboration and creativity, and the new thing is born.  This past week I looked over the organizational chart of our local chamber.  As I scanned it I instinctively began crossing off duties deemed the responsibility of a chamber staff.  These services were in many ways already being offered via the community. Many others could easily be handled by individuals or groups that are passionate about a service.  If the chamber allowed many of these services to grow organically (which I would argue that they are regardless of the chambers permission) then they could ease the burden of the member dues as well as give the staff time and resources to fulfill their mission better.  Will I become a chamber member?  I guess it depends on what changes the chamber is willing to make.  Only time will tell.

Like I said before.  I am writing this from an outsiders mindset. I would encourage you to convince me either way.

Popularity: 5% [?]

I found this video via @jdale and @tshuttleworth and I had to share it with you.  I have had several people this week ask me if Social Media is a fad.  Well my simple answer is no.  In fact I agree with the statement in the video that “it is the biggest shift since the Industrial Revolution”.  It is changing our habits, how we digest media, how we connect and engage with people and our description of community.  Socialnomics09 did a great job pulling together my favorite quotes and statistics. Enjoy. I would love to hear your comments.

Popularity: 6% [?]