The power of the moving image

Much is written about the iniquitous impact of the moving image on human sensibility. What you see translates into what you do. Violence begetting violence. Etc etc.

But how about the positive impact? How about using video for positive messaging?

How about movies that put you off. Right off.

Twitter makes the first draft of history

Much has been written about Twitter overtaking FaceBook in the social networking popularity wars, but for me the search or navigation part of Twitter has to get a good deal more sophisticated before FB need worry. If you're not on Twitter 24/7, you will miss the few tweets you really wanted to read in the vast avalanche of advancing messages that arrange themselves chronologically in real time on your home page. I dip in and out and have to spend much longer than I really want to sifting through the garbage like a magpie looking for the glint of something attractive. It's dull work, and will soon have me finding quicker, sharper alternatives.

This real time dimension does, however, have one inalienable advantage. When a major world event happens, Twitter captures real time eye witness accounts that add up to crowdsourced journalism, or history in its first draft. You Tube has revolutionised the reporting of controversial news with immediate, individual eye witness accounts beamed across the world, and Twitter does the same with its instant sharing of tiny messages.

How useful would it be now if there had been some passengers on the AirFrance Rio-Paris flight urgently uploading tweets on what was going on in that plane?

BlackBerry, Apple or Pomegranate?

I'm not quick to jump on new tech gadgets however quick I am to read about them. So I've been letting reviews, personal recommendations and a few hands-on sessions percolate through the stubborn layers of indecision before upgrading my antediluvian brickbat of a phone. (Actually I decided today that for all my love of all things Apple, I was going to be sensible and go for the BlackBerry Curve 8900). In the course of many happy Google hours interrogating the fruit salad of options, I came across the Pomegranate. Someone out there had even more time than me - check out especially the coffee brewing and shaving options.

Is it all vanity?

Over the last few months I've found that I was being asked quite frequently for examples of my various verbal outpourings, and being naturally disorganised, was spending silly amounts of time scanning in pages from dog-eared copies of the FT or various magazines and emailing them off. Then I thought why not put all this stuff together on a personal site? Much more sensible.

So it came to pass that lizbolshaw.com was born. It's unavoidably self, self, self and writing about yourself in the third person is somehow cringe-making, but on the other hand at least now people can drop in and find my various musings on Web 2.0, interviews with entrepreneurs and even a rather surreal piece on extravagant treehouses.

It comes as I succumb to Twitter and connect with old friends on FaceBook and generally paddle in the shallows of social media. All this mental junk food gives one a hunger for a bit of Proust or Foucault to chew on.