Geolocative Phone Paranoia

This is great! I get to walk around the 'City' and find out where my 'Friends' are located and I can move towards them or move away from them. I can even find out where they are when they should be walking in the door of the bar that I have been sitting in for the past 45 minutes sucking down seltzer water to the consternation of the bartender.

For example, we are walking down the block, me one way and you the other our, geo-locative boxes squawk in some way the proximity and direction of the other. So now having this information changes the entire direction and nature of the interaction.

One would consider the implications of running into each other, maybe someone was rude earlier or whatever...but the point is your analytical decision process kicks in and it imagines the encounter. The analytical mind would weigh the pros and cons and it makes value judgment. It would imagine these things, mind you, then you would determine if you want to run like hell the other way.

Now you might think that is great! You get to avoid all those people you don't want to run into. But of course these are people that have been allowed to be in your "network," lets say facebook friends, so they know you are there and are running away, but maybe you are invisible. Or maybe you drop somebody. So for people on a list you are now fully engaged in a continual qualitative judgment process regarding a persons character, views, impression, etc. Now you run away from the blip, regardless of the reason, to escape the perpetual recursive judgment.

The setting Pride and Prejudice, except now with our new tools Jane would continually avoid those meaningful confrontations with Darcy and grow into spinsterhood. Prejudice would limit your overall exposure to unforeseen circumstances, coincidences and "happenstance."

So you shouldn't move away from the blip, ignore the blip, and stumble upon the person.

Help Fight Multiple Sclerosis By Giving Me Money to Ride a Bicycle

October is right around the corner, so I have started making my Halloween costume and collecting donations for the MS Ride '08. The ride is on October 5th. Last year I was very lame with my collections so I am stepping it up a notch.

It is also a little more poignant this year because Sheldon Brown passed in February. Sheldon Brown was an online bicycle guru that wrote essays and 'how to' articles on everything from touring Europe on two wheels, to explaining what a 'spline' was. His writing was extremely helpful, very funny and made you feel like you were getting advice from a well informed friend. He was diagnosed with MS in the waning years of his life and wrote this little essay about it that captures the tone of his personality.

I will be doing the 100 mile ride up through Congers, NY which is actually a real pain after you get out of Manhattan. The hills in the Palisades don't let you forget. After last year, I laid down at home, closed my eyes and felt like I was still on my bike pedaling uphill. So it was more like 115 miles.

If you feel like donating you can go to this site and do it all online!

https://www.kintera.org/faf/donorReg/donorPledge.asp?ievent=251540&supid=102798221