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Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!

I have 8 google wave invites if anyone wants one.
Message me your email if you want one.
Don't share email addresses in the thread please

Updated: I now have 23 of them. Doesn't anyone want one? :)

Tags for Forum Posts: google wave

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I have it - though I am still wondering what on earth to do with it at the moment. :) When I have time I shall have a play. What do you think?
I think it is going to be extremely useful for small groups sharing info (PSA?); gossiping (its fast); creating mini communities. It will be slow at first but as more people join the network, it should start to flow. I hate those long email conversations that clog up the inbox and if someone forget to hit reply all (usually me) people get half a conversation etc. This looks better.

As people write widgets and gizmos for it too (voice apps?), it's usefulness should manifest itself.

I think, like Twitter, it will just need practice and getting as many of your mates on there as possible.

My biggest problem is getting notifications about new content - I've installed a widget in igoogle to remind me its there so far.
There are so many ways of communicating now - messenger, facebook, twitter, e-mail et al.

But what are we saying ? :-)
Ah, there's the rub.
The medium is the message ?
I don't believe there was ever a time when people did not communicate.

The tools change whether it be the quill and parchment, the Edwardian postcard, email or Twitter, our need to communicate remains the same.

We do electronically what once we did on paper but the content does not vary from the time when people wrote notes and sent them via the servants: gossip, news, requests, ideas, arrangements, opinions, insults, jokes, love notes.

Then, as now, if the note/email went to the wrong person, scandal and opprobrium would ensue; then, as now to receive a letter/facebook message from someone after a long absence is a pleasure. Then, as now postcards/Twitter messages cause a smile.

It has even been suggested by the National Literacy Trust that all this e-talking is improving kids literacy skills.

Personally I love all this writing and talking, it appeals to my yearning to live back in the late 18th century (minus the smells and diseases) when people decided to write an enormous encyclopedia of knowledge (sound familiar?), most people wrote diaries (blogs anyone?) and letters were one of the main forms of communication between philosophers, artists and writers (clearly written to be published in most cases)(G wave?)

The difference now of course is that, unlike the past, is not just the elites that can participate in this great conversation, anyone with an internet connection and computer access can join in BUT here's the real rub: digital exclusion of the poorest and most vulnerable.

Figures released by the Office of National Statistics (ONS) in 2009, reveal that 30% of households in the Britain still did not have internet access.

Even though the majority of people in Britain have the internet, 10 million remain offline. Of those, 4 million are the most socially and economically vulnerable.

95% of adults with a degree or equivalent qualification were estimated to live in a household with internet access. Those with no formal qualification were least likely with just 52%. There is a clear link between social and digital exclusion. There is a danger that as more services and opportunities are delivered online, those who lack online access or the skills needed to take advantage of it, will be further disadvantaged.
We indeed privileged to live in the age of the greatest outpouring of human creativity ever, when anyone with the means to receive also has the tools to broadcast and publish.

As for the social exclusion: yes, there's a lot without computers etc. And a lot live round here - when I recently knocked on doors in my street a large number of people were unwilling/unable to do something online. We should recognise that just by being here we're part of an elite...

The question is of course what to do about it. Given the widespread adoption of mobile phones and cable/satellite TV into all segments of society I'm sanguine that this will also hold true for internet access. Indeed both phones and TV can and do act as internet access points. One day the technology will be as ubiquitous and unremarkable as electricity or water.
What's different this time round Liz is an almost overwhelming wave of communication possibilities. The scale is so vastly different, that comparison with the introduction of quill or postcard may seem risible to some.

It's not even the case that we simply have a plug-and-play choice of tools to make. The subtleties of each has to be learned, both in terms of its particular application as well as the nuts and bolts of usage. Once we have our heads round that we oughta not forget that our choices also have a significant impact on how we live our lives.

This is a communication revolution that requires some heavy lifting. That can hurt. For my money, it's important that we acknowledge to ourselves what we're in the midst of as well as considering how that feels for others.

(Right I'll climb down out of the pulpit now).
That's true but I was merely taking the long view to point out that communication is who we are.

Also don't underestimate the power of previous forms of communications, don't forget that in Edwardian England, there were 10 postal deliveries a day: a billet doux posted at 10.00 could arrive around the corner by 4pm. Also, exclusion was every bit as evident then as now from the cultural life of the middle and upper classes.

I also believe there was every bit as much etiquette involved in the different forms of communication in the past as there is now. Humans always create rules for behaviour to keep 'anarchy' at bay. Thus Twitter has evolved a set of rules which you have to learn every bit as hard as those at the French court at Versailles (although perhaps less dangerous). A bad tweet can lose you audience just as bad joke could lose you favour with the elites.

Yes, we are in a communication revolution but we've been there before. There will be winners and losers (here's hoping its Rupert Murdoch) and not the 4 million most vulnerable. They frightened the life out of people and governments in the past, regimes sought to surpress them, many predicted the end of civilisation (imagine ordinary people being able to read the Bible by themselves without the intervention of the elites, they'll be driven wild - some were). Its exciting and a bit scary and will affect the way we live but I believe in the long run it will bring about a change every bit as profound as the invention of the printing press.
Hopefully, this time around we won't feel the need to burn people at the stake for illegal filesharing
" that communication is who we are."

Well, no. I am who I am and I MAY wish to communicate that. But I use my mobile phone, not the other way round. I don't want technology to affect the way I live: I may use technology to facilitate the way I live.

We're drowning in a sea of babble and there's no time to think. :-)
John with all due respect, I feel you seem to think I am equating technology with communication. I'm not. Communication is the human element. We do this because it is in our nature. Technology is just a pile of parts.

I know a mobile phone is not who you are (I hardly ever know where mine is), nor how fancy your laptop is - mine is 6 years old and moves slower than I do.

It is the human spirit that operates it that counts. If anyone is drowning in 'a sea of babble', they have the power to simply operate the off switch and it is gone.

btw technology inevitably affects the way we live whether we want it to or not. Our streets are as they are because we gave them over to cars. This affected everyone, whether they wanted a car or not and in most cases they had no choice. Let's hope we learn some lessons from that designing out of people in favour of technology.
Ah, but if you don't communicate who you are through your thoughts and opinions, no one knows who you are. It bit like the analogy of the tree falling in the forest when there's no one around to see or hear it fall. That's where Decartes went a bit wrong. You may think, therefore you are, but if you are alone on a desert island, who can validate that?

On Liz's point I think there has been a complete change in the last 30 or so years in what communication and information is used for. Information is currency. Many people (and I'm one of them) get paid to spend a large proportion of their day creating and updating information and communicating this information with other people. Rather than manufacturing things, we're moving more and more to manufacturing and selling, in one way or another, data.

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