to my blog. Though got to look at formatting headers. That may just be an
issue of my having email setup for plain text so that I can post longer
responses to questions and debates on the SEAint email listserver
(structural engineers association international). With formatted text can
hardly say anything in response. Though occassionally I still send two plain
text emails as a response. So I do often write overly long responses. Though
they do get read, and occassionally requests are made to pass onto others:
building departments etc...
This tends to indicate that creating a twitter account and the 140 character
limit would be stifling. It some what is. Often times twitter is slow, and
tweetdeck hangs up as I attempt to do too many things at once, and faster
than it is able to respond. On the otherhand at school typically known for
being quite all year, and maybe uttering one sentence even one word: which
within the context was all that was needed to astound and transform. As they
say if you are talking you are not learning. So thus far on twitter have
been writing as if writing an essay, but some what in response to the stuff
that I retweet, and what ever is in my timeline. If I don't retweet what I
am responding to then, my tweets may loose context, but retweets may be lost
to others in anycase. So initial idea was to leave the last 20 tweets
visible on profile page when not logged in as a story. But since not
counting the tweets, doesn't actually happen, and my twittering is far
longer than the 20 tweets. When first started also easily exceeded the
hourly limits: as my previous blogs indicate. Essay type tweets, put lots of
words across many topics in my timeline. The result is a high score as a
wordsmith on some application: cannot remember its name, but scanned twitter
account and returned a score. Which is kind off interesting: since when
first got wordperfect, its grammar and style checker, indicated my writing
worst than an insurance policy. So in 20 odd years, since, my writing may
have improved. Though still tends to be all over the place, wandering from
topic to topic. My tweets tend to do the same, wandering from topic to
topic, but maybe having a common thread. Several different ideas going at
once, and maybe I will return and finish off the story on original topic: it
all depends on where my thoughts take me. {Not as entertaining as Billy
Connolly: but multiple stories going and leave audience wondering if will
return and finish original story.}
Tweets though are short independent statements, and need to stand on their
own. For between one tweet and the next, someone following may see tweets
from many different channels.
...
Got side tracked and went and grabbed todays tweets by using advanced search
and copying and pasting into UltraEdit, deleting rubbish, then copying into
MS Excel, numbering, and then sorting into descending order, then copy back
to UltraEdit. But whilst reading, noticed got into habit of reading from
bottom to top of page, rather than from top to bottom. So instead of making
more sense, made less. Go figure! Adaptation. Well in past I did watch TV in
mirror because it was behind me whilst using computer. Problem was
programmes in foreign language with subtitles, so subtitles reversed in
mirror. Doesn't take long to get used to reading. Though tend only focus on
one thing at a time. So either focus on watching TV or using computer. If
not constantly swapping between one and the other: one gets turned off.
From UltraEdit default print settings about 4 pages of tweets: pasting into
Word and its wrap around formatting about 5 pages with its default margins.
So for the same time frame I could have probably written twice as much.
Anycase really needs rewriting to present as a blog.
...
So should probably monitor twitter for current topic, but otherwise blog
about it, rather than tweet. Though the twitter stream is potentially better
at attracting an audience, though blog can give others better chance to
respond. Though I turned comments off, was only getting email spam.
One thing I don't like about Blogs is that they are all over the place, and
there is a tendency to require registering and logging into to respond. Such
gets cumbersome. So it seems commenting on own blog is maybe better
approach. After all news papers and journals generally comment about
articles elsewhere are reference. So what is the benefit of commenting
locally? Some have said comments shouldn't be longer than orginal post. Not
sure I agree with that, people have to say what they need to. But do
comments need to be read and responded to? Doing so could become time
consuming, and blogging is not how I make a living. Do not generally read
every journal and newpaper on a topic, even if deliberately researching then
will tend to limit to specific journals. So comments via another blog
pointing to blog being critised is probably better. Since in general they
don't want to tell the author of the critised blog anything, they want to
provide alternative view to the audience. But probably are good reasons for
short local comments, that generate some useful and productive interaction.
But as I say not if have to register and log in to comment.
Anycase at present have no readers and don't promote my Blog, and only
received spam comments. So at present comments have been switched off.
So a matter of changes to implement if actually move from talking to myself
to promoting blog and building an audience. But no real point pursuing that
path if not able to sustain. So this year not been spending time programming
VBA and building Excel workbooks as I normally do: instead been monitoring
twitter. Building Excel workbooks is a more productive thing to be doing,
along with Automating Acad and drawing standard details. But value of these
things is otherwise dependent on the needs of local community, possibly
global community. So at moment at least twitter is an important outlet for
frustration with industry and community, aswell as an important source of
information about.
So got to be able to meld the two together and get back to building Excel
workbooks. It is also now becoming apparent that participation on SEAint
does tend towards becoming repetitive with respect to somethings. So placing
my response on a blog and pointing to that can reduce time spent on
alternative versions of a long responses. So time spent responding to
SEAint, which was getting time consuming, can otherwise be spent blogging
and responding more directly to the industry and community issues I have
with respect to design and engineering.
So need to spend some time building website and blogging and getting
information from mind into communication medium. Already have stacks written
on scrap paper filling boxes around me. So getting from mind not problem,
communicating it is the problem.
Well because just as like now, early hours of the morning I get to writing,
traditionally on paper, when I should be getting to sleep.
