Last Post of 2007:

In reading my last post of 2006 just a few minutes ago, I noticed how battered I seemed this time a year ago, proud I was still standing, but not eager to repeat any part of the previous 12 months. Not one day of it. I had hoped and predicted to 2007 would be a year of "bold aventures, impending opportunities, limitless possibility."

And so it has been. This year I started a company, wrote two book proposals, traveled far and saw much. I deepened relationships with old friends and family and made new ones. I learned about classical music and theater, about what my city and country can and will do to shape its destiny. I ran eight miles without stopping. I fell in love.

I am never sad to see a year go because, if I've done my job living wisely and well, it will have prepared me for the year to come and I have no regrets. But as I write this, after watching an achingly beautiful sunset, my woman across the table from me on her own laptop, I feel just a little bit sad. Because in a decade or so, I will have looked back at 2007 as the year where so much of what now treasure was first born.

But that's for then. Tonight I will spend a quiet night at home enjoying the last bundle of hours of our joint vacation. Next week's for laying out the 2008 game plan, reflecting on new possibilities and second chances. Then it's back to work, a new president, new projects, more ways of looking at our world. A new year.

I believe we are in fact offered this every day if we choose to take advantage of it. New Year's Eve is just the global reminder that such redemption exists, and belongs to each of us.

So goodbye 2007. Thank you for what you have shown me. In return I promise to use it to guide me forward into 2008 and see the bounty of this past year with wisdom, respect and profound gratitude.

Straight on 'till morning....

Books I'm excited about: "Black Artists of Oakland"

Heard about this one on KALW's Artery. Ordered it from Diesel Books and will use it as a guide to explore my neighbor to the east this coming year.

One Sentence Movie Reviews: "Teddy Bear's Picnic"

Teddy Bear's Picnic (2002): "Too little investment in character and story,even for a comedy, makes for too little a movie."

Notes: Based on the Bohemian Grove the story of which is twice as compelling as this fictional version.

My audio prayers have been answered...

So my buddy Dave and I have been trying to come up with a way, for eons, to record the two of us talking on Skype and have it sound, say, slightly better than two idiots talking on Skype. When I looked around, I pretty much heard "yeah, that'd be great, wouldn't it?"

Well my prayers have been answered. My awesome audiophilic friend Sue Mell send me a video tutorial entitled "Skype for Interviews - A How-To," which pretty much gets right to it. It's put together by the good people at The Conversations Network (whose Social Innovation podcast I listen to without fail) and walks you through how to set the whole thing up in plain, conversational English.

I can't wait to try this out. One of my New Year's goals is to start another podcast of conversations with people I admire. This is exactly the tool I need.

ADDENDUM: Sue Mell also pointed me to Association of Independents in Radio, where she found out about the tutorial. AIR is a professional group which represents the interests of and creates opportunities for audio producers across media. 

Sore on Crowdsourcing:

An interesting take on "Crowdsourcing", a word I've probably used too many times, from my friend Tara Hunt.

'Crowdsourcing’ is usually about benefiting one source…the company or individual asking for the advice/ideas. Unless the ’sourcer’ can build something into the process that makes certain it rewards individuals contributing in those ‘crowds’. Open Source communities are actually awesome examples of valuable contributors finding rewards organically - access to better jobs, ability to turn their expertise into consulting gigs, wide influence in the community itself, which will lead to speaking gigs, teaching gigs, writing books, etc.

I’ve been a long opponent to the term ‘Crowdsourcing’ as it invokes the image of an unpaid group of volunteers giving ideas for free while a corporation rakes in endless profits from them. It speaks to the further exploitation and general suckage of customer goodwill. I don’t think it is related to it’s positive cousin, Open Source. Open source is the term used to describe the state of the source code: can you see it? Is it hidden? Outsourcing is a closer relation, describing the act of saving money by hiring employees from low cost labor markets…only ‘Crowdsourcing’ goes one step further and doesn’t pay the labor at all. Sounds like a sweet deal, right?

Crowdsourcing is another short-term way of thinking about how one can benefit from the relationships one has in communities. Over the longterm, any Social Capital one had will be whittled away from exhausting this free-labor force. Beware of catchy buzzwords, because they are usually all razzle dazzle and no substance.

Readability?

It seems measuring the "readability" of this blog results in a "something went wrong" error. What gives ya'll? (via Social Media.biz)

Word of the Day: "Gainsay"

Gainsay (verb): "To deny, dispute or contradict."

Source: Yesterday's New York Times Crossword Puzzle which I get worse at by the day.

One Sentence Movie Reviews: "Juno"

Juno (2007): "I have a thing for movies that you can watch with the picture turned off because the dialog is so good."

Seen: With my woman on the first official day of our joint vacations.

Gathering of the Brains: Conference on World Affairs 2007:

I've been meaning to go to the Conference on World Affairs, held every April in Boulder, Colorado, since I first read Roger Ebert's writings about it when I was a teenager. Ebert, who has attended the conference 38 years in a row, summed it up thusly..

“Why is this week like lifeblood for me? Once we settle into our life’s careers, most of us charge the line      with our heads down, doing our jobs and trying to get ahead. We become specialists, and develop tunnel vision. I have a tendency, for example,to think the world revolves around movies. Once a year at the Conference, I am forced to think on subjects not of my own choosing. I get to talk to people from other worlds.”

Celebrating its 60th anniversary this year, the CWA is the granddaddy of the get-a-bunch-of-smart-people-in-a-room-and-have-everyone-benefit-conference mold that would later give birth to the Idea Festival and TED.

For me, the Conference on World Affairs seems to perennially fall in that netherworld between recovering from SXSW and gearing up for the San Francisco International Film Festival. But this year, it's coming in early April, a full two weeks after Austin and before SFIFF.

It just may happen this time around.  Look at who's coming already.

Planet Thought for 2008:

Compelled by this last post, I did a little looking into some green business initiatives currently at work.

• TerraCycle: I don't garden but I'm a big fan of TerraCycle, started by two Princeton students in 2001, and whose flagship product is plant food make from worm crap and packaged in used soda bottles. They've since branched out with an array of garden products, a crowd-sourcing materials strategy,  R&D through contests, and a guidebook on Eco-Capitalism. This sounds like the coolest place to work in America.

• TerraPass: I offset my driving, travel and home energy use with TerraPasses. One of my New Year's resolutions for 2008 is to greenify my home as best I can. So I'll be cutting the energy output of my domicile with some of the green products they recommend.

• Blue Egg: Is a green lifestyle site that I haven't quite figured out yet. Sounds interesting though.

• GreenBiz.com is a publication highlighting the green business revolution. I've just subscribed to their rss feed.