Comments on: Stop, now, what’s that sound

By: The future of interactive TV and Radio is here and it doesn’t need a big red button « Damien Mulley

Wed, 18 Mar 2009 10:12:14 +0000

[...] media hopping from one to the other and back again. This is going back to my other blog post about shared experiences and Twitter and all the rest, We can be in our living rooms and on Twitter at the same time, sharing both [...]

By: Heather James

Heather James — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 12:00:55 +0000

Thanks for stopping by, Damien

If I had known I was going to have guests, I’d have tidied up a bit, and at least put my face on!

Your post confirms what I had been suspecting… there is alot of opportunity online in Ireland right now. Yes, I do think it’s a zeitgeist. I wanted to write an encouraging post to point my web design students to:

http://www.igopeople.com/g/15-web-designers/posts/3216-why-there-s-so-much-opportunity-in-web-development-programming-right-now

I came to Ireland in 2000, I was still working for my old company developing Flash games. I was working from home doing web development, using the web as my main form of income. It was also my connection to friends and family abroad. I didn’t realize how ‘different’ my perception of the web was from those in Ireland…

For me, my early experiences of the Internet was about instant communication via IRC channels… if you’re familiar with that, then Twitter doesn’t seem that revolutionary. What’s revolutionary is that IRC, while widely used, doesn’t have the obvious appeal of Twitter. It doesn’t have the name-brand recognition, and because it doesn’t exist on the web, it’s hidden and under the radar.

ICQ (remember ICQ??) was revolutionary… instant communication via text with someone across the globe was… really exciting. In a warm “wow, you’re on the other end of the line” kinda way. Many IM programs later, and isn’t IM a bit annoying? We expect an immediate response.

Twitter/Facebook updates have the good aspects of logged-chat through IRC, and the lagged response of Email, and the brevity of IM. It’s a great format.

But I didn’t want to wax on how nice Twitter is. I wanted to point back to the fact that the web has been widely used for 15 years… but it seems like people in Ireland are only ‘discovering’ it more now.

When I moved to Ireland in 2000, I did spend alot of time online with old friends in the US, expats elsewhere, etc. And I felt like there was a dirth of Irish people online. I couldn’t figure out where the ‘buzz’ was. I saw company websites, and the odd dead web forum- but no action.

I set up a blog for the arts organisation I was working for in 2002… but no one in Ireland seemed to know what a blog was. At least no one we worked with. Comments? on a webpage? I don’t think people knew what to do with them.
http://web.archive.org/web/20020529225415/http://www.kidsown.ie/

I blogged back in 2003 when I was doing my MSc, but I was only able to connect to people in the US/Canada/UK… there simply weren’t many (any?) in a blogging community online in Ireland. Isolated bloggers, yes… but not much of a commenting community. I did meet up with Bernie Goldbach, but of course he’s an expat like me. And maybe because of the distance from family and friends, he was also prompted to online communication.

I just feel like, as far as we think we’ve come we still have a loooong way to go. There’s so much room for opportunity online in Ireland, and a great need for talent.

Oh I’ve just gone on a tangent now!

Thanks for the post and for stopping by my Twitter feed

By: Susan

Susan — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 10:26:57 +0000

Love this post.

Young people in particular for SpunOut.ie can be reached, engaged and mobilized through the Internet. It is powerful. Very exciting times.

Positive social change can happen and these tools are helping to make it happen. There is savage power in technology and now is the time to embrace it and do something. Time for online action.

By: Calvin Jones

Calvin Jones — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 08:53:49 +0000

Great post Damian.

Every technology has it’s advocates and detractors… Twitter, Facebook and other social tools are no different. I’m sure there were people arguing the toss about the relative merits of cave wall drawings and smoke signals back in the day.

None of that really matters — it’s not about the medium or the technology — it’s about making connections between people. That’s where the power of Twitter and other social tools really lies.

I’m losing count of the number of times I first “meet” people I already know via Twitter. We launch immediately into conversation about things we know are interesting and relevant to both of us. The usual ice-breaking has happened online… which makes meeting face to face that much more productive.

That’s just one brief example of myriad ways that online tools can empower people not just online, but offline too. There are plenty more.

Sometime in the not too distant future people are going to look back at our online / offline divide and laugh — because for a whole new generation of people, there really is no distinction — there’s just “life”.

Sounds like a topic to add to the lengthy list of blog posts I never get around to writing ….

By: Niall Harbison

Niall Harbison — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 01:03:55 +0000

Great post Damo. I have often thought about setting posts to music but being the little trendsetter/all round dude you have beat me to the punch! I agree 100% with the sentiment of what you say here

By: paul savage

paul savage — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 20:10:06 +0000

As someone once said to me, the nail and the top of the hammer are at the same place.

While being relatively new to twitter myself I do find the great power of being able to tap into the zeitgeist, to crowd source, and just to interact. It’s great to see these “tech tools” gathering traction, and becoming mainstream. Mainstream is also okay

Paul

By: Nick McGivney

Nick McGivney — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 19:30:55 +0000

Ah ya big softie ya. Hugs!

By: Ciara Crossan

Ciara Crossan — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 13:00:03 +0000

What a positive and uplifting post. I have a very difficult time explaining Facebook to my parents, and twitter/blogging to my friends!
But the sense of community out there in Ireland is fantastic and I have met (and will continue to) new business acquaintances and friends through this medium. Tweet-ups are happening more and more often where online friends get together and engage with each other. It is not a load of socially-challenged nerds holed up in dark rooms as some people out there think – quite the opposite!
Happy Friday everyone

By: Gerry Mulvenna

Gerry Mulvenna — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 12:26:14 +0000

Loved this post, Damien. What resonated with me is the challenge to the believe that “social media” is curtailing friendships in real life. My children who are old enough use Bebo to maintain friendships with “real” friends across multiple countries and to establish and strengthen fresh friendships in their new home.

By: Ant Galvin

Ant Galvin — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 11:25:50 +0000

I see my online life as one that has slowly grown new body parts since my first web-site in 1996… And the same goes for the web as a whole. The basic infrastructure of Lungs (networks) and Hearts (HTML) and stuff have been around for ages. Only in the last ten years have the useful functional bits like arms (blogs) and legs (social networks) shown up.

Now we have Twitter – And its nourishment. Its the engagement to tie the rest together.