I’ve been noticing something happening to me more and more often recently: serendipitous social connections being made between me and old friends, strangers, or even between two people I barely know, as a result of some data I put up publicly on the net.
Here’s three examples over just the past few days:
I twittered a meeting I was having earlier week with Lisa Congdon at Rare Device, who I met through my pal Kate Bingaman-Burt, and as a result, someone I don’t even know named Beth, was reconnected with Lisa. Beth and I don’t know each other, Lisa and I just met this week, and Kate and I have only communicated through digital means… we’ve never met in person.
I posted a photo of a dollar bill I had that reminded me of a side project of a guy that used to work for me… seven years ago. As a result, I got an email from him the next day.
I posted this photo of a special bottle of Dr. Pepper I bought back in February. Yesterday, I got this emailthrough Facebook from a gal I don’t know looking for the soda in the Bay Area for a friend who’s obsessed with the drink and has a birthday coming up.
Of course, none of these events are truly serendipitous, they’re all indicative of the incredibly interconnected fabric of social connection we’re weaving online with every piece of information we put out there. The more we open ourselves up, the more we’re weaved into the social fabric, with each piece of information we release becoming a possible point of connection (or re-connection) with old and new friends.
One of the rooms in my apartment just opened up, and I’m considering either finding a new roommate or making the room available as a share for people who visit SF often and would prefer to have a furnished room in SF that they can use a few days to a week a month for less than they’d spend on one night in a hotel room.
If that’s of interest, or if you know someone looking for an apartment, read on…
If you or an equally awesome friend is looking for an apartment in San Francisco (starting mid August to Sept 1), a room is about to open up in my apartment. It’s a three bedroom in San Francisco that I share with two other people, and one of them (Jenny) is starting grad school and moving into school housing.
In Duboce Triangle (seriously great, super walkable neighborhood with tree-lined streets, and lots of places to eat.) A quick walk to the Lower Haight or Castro. 2 blocks from Duboce Park (swell dog park — and the apt itself is dog-friendly.) Within 3 blocks, you’ll find burritos, burgers, vietnamese and chinese, bars, a gym, and a 24-hour Safeway (grocery store)
Washer and Dryer in unit.
Shared Kitchen + living room + bathroom
2 blocks from the Church St. MUNI (K,M,T) and N-Judah, J-Church, F-Market, and 22.
$550/month. (Yes this is the insane part. It’s rent controlled because my other roommate has been there for a while.)
p.s. If you’re interested in the share idea, drop me a line. I have one person interested so far, and it’d be around $100-200/month.
I was hanging out with my friend Frederick Johnson last week and he was telling me about a really neat photography drill he had to do when training with the military to be a combat photojournalist (you’ll have to wait for the Photojojo Book to hear that one.)
Anyway, we were talking about the exercise, and Frederick challenged me to take portraits of five complete strangers in 10 minutes, right then and there. I’m happy to say I made the challenge in under 10, and got a baby and a dog to boot. :) And had a ton of fun!
I’ve been blogging less over the past few months, but I’ve found myself gravitating to Twitter and Tumblr for quicker, more informal updates and finds.
This blog’s in need of an update, and it looks like I may eventually move it over to Tumblr entirely.
For the moment, though, I’ll keep up with all three. If you’re interested in what I’m up to, I hope you’ll follow me on Twitter and Tumblr!
I took a secular sabbath today, turning off my computer and phone, putting away my wallet, and refraining from doing anything that involved electricity, fire, or useful work from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday (today).
Here’s how it went…
Friday
5:30p: Leave work and head to the Indian consulate to pick up my visa for a trip I’m taking next month.
Long line at the consulate. I’m worried I’m not going to get out before dark so I can take the Muni home.
Checking email on my iPhone, I see a blog comment from Noel on my secular sabbath post. I hastily go to approve it, notice a typo in the post, decide to fix it, and accidentally delete the post. Frack. I feel stupid for deleting it, but I can’t re-write it on the phone, and sabbath will have started by the time I get out of here.
5:50p: Thinking about writing this post while standing in line. Feel silly for ruining the experience by wanting to document it.
6:10p: Got my passport, leave the consulate. It’s getting dark so I reach to turn off my phone and notice I missed a call from my mom. I forgot to tell her I’m off the grid until Saturday night. Frack.
I can’t take the Muni, so I walk the 1.8 miles home in the dark.
Get home, realize I don’t have my keys. Must have left them at my office and no one’s home. My first instinct is to call my roommates, which I can’t do. I sit and wait for a while… maybe 30 minutes, I have no watch.
Rested, and tired of waiting, I walk the 1.8 miles back to the office to get my keys.
Grab my keys, talk to Paul and Phil for a bit. Watch the Heysan crew play Wii Golf. Looking for a non work-related activity, I borrow a pamphlet on SOMA from George. Think about drawing, but remember that I can’t create anything. There’s nothing I can do here that doesn’t use electricity or involve work.
Walk 1.8 miles home. It’s cold.
8:30p: Read for a while. Not sure what to do with myself. Go to bed.
Saturday
I keep waking up in the early A.M. very worried that we have a publisher deadline for the Photojojo book on Monday that I’ve totally forgotten about. It’s gonna take all-nighters to make it if I’m right, but I can’t check my calendar, and couldn’t work on it anyway. It’s hard to let it go and go back to bed.
8:58a: Wake up without an alarm. Still wondering about that deadline.
Read The Fountainhead for a few hours. Eat granola bars.
My mind wanders back to work frequently, so I borrow a trick I read online and write the idea/to-do/whatever on a scrap of paper and toss it on my desk to worry about after Sabbath. It helps.
1:30p: I shower and head to the park. It’s a lovely feeling to leave the house with just a few books and a key. No phone, no ID, no wallet.
Spend a couple hours in Duboce Park, watching dogs being happy, reading The Fountainhead and The Works
3:30p: Come home, not sure what to do. Finish The Fountainhead. Try to think about what’s making me happy in my life right now, and what isn’t. What I should be doing more of.
Fall asleep.
6:20p: Wake up. Sabbath is over. I check my email, Twitter, and Flickr. Read some responses from folks interested in how it went. Do a quick errand, head to the gym, then to the office. Call my mom on the way.
Summary: I spent a lot of time reading and wasn’t sure what else to do. Friday was hard and I felt itchy about email and wanted to work, but Saturday I mostly just felt calm. I thought a lot, but not the focused soul-searching kind of thinking I expected. I think I was afraid to.
I did have to force myself to stop thinking about work. I liked reading all day, but I was counting down the hours towards the end.
Being disconnected for 24 hours isn’t that long, but during those hours I felt like I was missing a lot. Logging on afterward, it didn’t feel like I missed anything important.
For next time: Prepare food ahead of time. Remember my key. Spend more time unstructured, just thinking and taking notes.
I had a conversation with my old friend (and former Daily Jolt Co-Founder/ current MoveOn Campaign Director) Noah T. Winer this past weekend that made me think more about the value of regular rest and reflection.
I told him how it was really hard for me not to think about the projects I’m working on almost all of the time, and Noah talked about the calm and energy he got from taking a day off every week to disconnect, relax, meditate, and think.
Shortly after our conversation, I came across an NYT article about Secular Sabbath, and decided to try it. The concept of a day of rest exists in many religions, and logically I bet there’s a healthy reason for it.
So today I’m leaving work a little early so that I can run an errand and make it home before sun down. Then I’ll turn off my phone and my computer, and won’t buy anything, use anything that requires electricity or fire, or do anything that could be termed “useful work†until sundown on Saturday.
I may visit friends… though I’m not sure how I’ll do that without being able to arrange it in advance or use Google Maps. :) I’ll probably read and go enjoy the outside.
In researching Sabbath, I was surprised to learn Blue laws are still in effect in many parts of the United States, barring all sorts of things–liquor sales, commerce, hunting…–on Sundays as a state-instituted day of rest. I think that’s dumb. Also, Paramus, NJ, which has the zip code with the highest retail sales in the country, also has some of the most strict laws against commercial activity on Sundays. Go figure.
Someone I don’t know sent this email to me today. The project sounds interesting… reminds me of those ones where mail around a disposable camera.
But it’s not for me. Posting with permission in case anyone else is interested in helping Austin.
From: Austin Sprenkel To: me Date: Feb 23, 2008, at 12:29 AM
So the other day I was thinking, I want to do a ‘project’ where we take 1 white macbook. We then send this macbook to various people around the world (Creative Professionals) rotating people each week or so. At the end of the project, say maybe after about 4 months, we get the macbook back and find on it a compilation of work, documents, music, internet browser history, bookmarks, movies, photos, downloads, messages etc. etc. that have all been on this computer from a diverse group of people that have worked on it. When it is received we will have compiled a ‘personality’ if you will on the computer, after collecting a ‘piece’ of each user. We will document the amount of time the computer has spent with each individual, as well as record their name and address.
This is just a fresh idea that needs a bit of planning and polishing, so let me know your thoughts and opinions. The reason I am contacting you about it is I have been following some of your site, like photojojo, your blog and specifically Jelly! and it seems to me you are quit the ’social networker’, which I believe is the category the project falls under. Please let me know your thoughts and ideas! I would like very much to work with you on this project if you are interested! My contact info is listed below, and you can reach me any time!
Austin Sprenkel
Williams+Asti Creative Studio
937.409.4954
asprenkel@mac.com
www.astilifestyle.com
JoshSpear.com, the the trend-spotting blog, published an interview with me today. It feels vain to link to it, but what the hell. I say some silly things. Thanks Carmen, Heather, and Josh!
The Hype Machine has a new beta site ready to go, but they won’t throw open the doors until 10,000 people visit at the same time. :) It’s a ploy worthy of their name.
I had a chance to play around with the beta, and it’s gorgeous. Congrats to Anthony, Taylor, and the rest!
His latest project is Photojojo. If you like photography, you will like Photojojo.
Before Photojojo, he was a founder of The Daily Jolt, an online community on 100 college campuses, helped create a non-profit called ChangeThis with Seth Godin, and brought the technology un-conference BarCamp to NYC. He also started a weekly casual coworking session called Jelly.
And he's consulted for companies such as Pearson, Apple, and Creative Good and co-authored The Big Moo, a WSJ best-seller, with Seth Godin, Malcolm Gladwell, Guy Kawasaki, Tom Peters, and others.
JoshSpear.com, the the trend-spotting blog, 
