horresco referens
from the blog "MixMaster"
I'd always envisioned nomadlife acting as a coffee shop, where people could sit around and discuss whatever topics arouse them. With a common set of interests, a megaphone for your voice (your blog), and a connector (nomadlife.org), I had thought everything in place to develop one continuous, amorphous, evolving conversation.
I will opine that this has not happened. Instead, it's been a lot of 1-way talking. Few posts actually build on each other.
Additionally, many of the big voices within my circle have fallen rather silent lately, and a few others I think would be of value have failed to find their tune. This is not judgmental, but rather observational and worth noting. These voices often act as water coolers around which many others stand.
Why do you think it turned out this way? Do you think it could be different? What environment is optimal to you?
I'd always envisioned nomadlife acting as a coffee shop, where people could sit around and discuss whatever topics arouse them. With a common set of interests, a megaphone for your voice (your blog), and a connector (nomadlife.org), I had thought everything in place to develop one continuous, amorphous, evolving conversation.
I will opine that this has not happened. Instead, it's been a lot of 1-way talking. Few posts actually build on each other.
Additionally, many of the big voices within my circle have fallen rather silent lately, and a few others I think would be of value have failed to find their tune. This is not judgmental, but rather observational and worth noting. These voices often act as water coolers around which many others stand.
Why do you think it turned out this way? Do you think it could be different? What environment is optimal to you?
posted by Jesse at 6:37 AM
11 Comments:
i blame facebook...
9:13 AM
I think it's more because nomadlife is a lot bigger than it was even 1 year ago. Many bloggers join because they hear about it through AIESEC or a friend who's an AIESECer. So they're not necessarily clued into the discussions that happen on the nomadone.
I don't think it's necessarily bad. The really big topics always get a lot of comments and opinions. The smaller ones get responses from who ever is interested in them... It's a bit like an unfiltered/ unorganised forum...
9:51 AM
yeah i have to agree with mixmaster's sentiments, I also hope it could be much more of a platform for discussion. I have to admit though, I'm fairly lazy myself so it's not like I really contribute much...
2:37 PM
Part of the problem is it's just too damn much work to carry on a conversation...
Until recently you had to work to get the other portions of the conversation. (now you can get follow up comments by email) But you still have to be aware of the first comment.
I've yet to set up a rss reader after reconfiguring my computer, and i'm debating not doing it. It's just too easy to get spread out and end up with a horrible signal to noise ratio that leaves you either deleting all or falling behind.
4:29 PM
There are a couple of problems with the way nomadone works right now.
1. Conversations are pushed down after a new entry added and disappears after 4 days.
2. Right now it's hard for people to post items on nomadone that's actually dedicated in a specific topic without turning nomadone into a niche blog (politic or economy or trivias, etc)
3. Using blogger to post short links can be quite cumbersome. A tumble blog with a good forum might be a good alternative to the current blog format for nomadone.
9:12 AM
BG: http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2007/12/28/12-filtering-tips-for-better-information-in-half-the-time-rss-delicious-and-stumbleupon/
Dode: I'm not even really thinking about nomadone. It could probably use some tweaking, but it works as a simple home base. What I'm talking more about is the conversation across nomadlife. With 1500 blogs, I'd envisioned the need for our own techmeme-like hub. This would signal 2 awesome things:
a) Conversations across the network are being generated that many people wish to weigh in on
and
b) They are propagating across blogs, meaning people are using their own blog as a venue to articulate and contribute their ideas to a greater conversation
5:22 PM
Let me take a stab at html. Don't laugh. Here's the link
5:24 PM
I have an idea for a more collective nomadone:
In addition to the front page being populated by posts bloggers physically have to do, is it possible to be populated with snippets from posts from the entire community, from each individual blog?
But I don't mean than it should be a collective of all sorts of random information from random posts across this 1500 blog network, to be really useful it would need to be categorized.
So for example, if I want to read posts related to 'travel adventures', I would select such category to be viewed on the front page, then it would be populated with posts tagged 'travel adventures' from across the nomadlife community. All other posts that I find to not be relevant will then be hidden.
This would require a customizable nomadone home page for each user. Thus what each nomad blogger finds interesting can be displayed on the front page. If we can read posts from across nomadlife, conversations will more easily be contributed to, and we can become more familiar with the entire community.
5:51 PM
Johny,
I think it depends whether people are using nomadlife as a source of information or as the place to find information.
I suspect a lot of people just check the site once a day or once a week just out of habit to see some interesting stuff online. It's like a slacker version of an online community.
6:44 PM
Dody,
I think Johnny's idea is pretty good. We could change the way nomadone appears. Make it sort of newsy..
Basically, nomadone won't be the only thing that appears on the nomadlife.org homepage. We can also add multiple categories. Each category will draw from recent nomad posts that have used that category as a tag.
Think of it like the homepage of CNN. You have your main news section (nomadone) and then you have all the various beats (tags) under it with correspondents (bloggers) regularly writing for each beat.
4:43 AM
Interesting topic - I use nomadlife as a source of international news and travel information. And I like to see what Aiesecers are doing in other parts of the world and talk about what I'm doing.
I'm less inclined to get into a discussion on here because:
1) Written word can be very easily misinterpreted.
2) I don't have the time I'd like to dedicate to a serious discussion. I would need to be able to look up information to back me up, and I'd need time to review what I wrote so I could make sure it wouldn't be misinterpreted.
10:49 PM
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