Thank goodness I go through Akismet piece by piece. For some reason it tagged your comment as spam. Clearly it doesn’t know how highly I think of you and your work.

I hope that you enjoy The Dream Society. I think it’s one of the seminal works on story and its place in our society. If you read it and get a chance to share your thoughts I’d love to hear them. Seth’s book is good as well. I think it’s his best yet. He tackles some very thorny issues. I suspect you’ll enjoy it a lot.

I have not read Ong’s work but I’ll head over to Amazon as soon as I post this. I can hardly wait to read that. And, I’ll keep my eye out for anything that deals with video as it relates to that and send it your way. That has my curiosity engaged as well. And in line with what you said about Orality –> Literacy –> Digitization –> Visuality, were we Graphical/Visual (drawings, etc.) before we were Oral? And if so, and if we are moving towards Visuality, are we circling or are we enhancing this new visual with our oral and literary history?

Love reading your blog and listening to you think about the future.

Best wishes,

Gregg

Thanks for the mention in this post. The Dream Society sounds great, I’m adding it to my book list now. I see you also have Linchpin under recommended reading – I just got that in the mail recently, just trying to find the time to read it.

I love what you’re getting at with storytelling – I’ve been exploring that as well with my research, and what happens when we move from Orality to Literacy to Digitization & Visuality. And also, as Nancy mentions above, where do ethics and logic and THINKING come in (or go out) with these new mediums?

If you haven’t read it yet, I’d recommend Walter Ong’s ‘Orality and Literacy’ for a very interesting read on how the printed word has altered the process of thinking over the centuries. I’m really curious about how that’s shifting again as more people are consuming video instead of reading. If you happen to come across any research about this, please send it my way. Thanks!

- @venessamiemis
http://www.emergentbydesign.com

Well gee, I thought I was going to be able to stop thinking for the day. Thanks for making me re-engage. And thank you too for the kind words in your opening.

I suspect that you are exactly correct about someone(s) figuring out the means to sort, etc. I’m kind of looking forward to that and hope I’m still around to see it. I also suspect that regardless of who discovers that, marketers, government agencies and groups we probably don’t even know about yet, will be compiling just what you suggest for the motives you mention. I sense that you can see all of the bad things that might transpire from this. (I’m an old protester from the 60’s, I can relate to that.) I wonder, have you flipped the lens and thought about all of the really neat things that could happen as a result of that? I would bet that you have, and for my part, I am hopeful and excited by it. Sure, we could get flushed down the toilet. But, we could also advance to places we have only dreamed about. You put it very well in terms of the greatest leap or the worst fall. I’m betting on leap. Just as Gutenberg’s invention helped close the doors on the Dark Ages and launch ages of enlightenment, learning and invention (oh sure, there have been some bad times during those 500+ years), I’m betting that we see similar progress as we move forward through this time of transformation.

The issue of ever shorter and faster communications is one I think about a lot. I don’t have an answer yet but I have noticed a trend on Twitter towards more thoughtful tweets. Whether that’s a short or long term thing I don’t know. Blogging, as you might expect given the medium, seems to me much more thoughtful and geared toward generating conversation than it has in the past. I think that Mark’s blog is a glowing example of this. I think that the traditional disciplines will be able to weather the storm and may even be the stronger for it.

What do you think?

There is a 10th anniversary edition of Cluetrain available now. If you decide to buy it, make sure you get that one. You can also read the original online for free. Chris Anderson’s got nothing on them.

Your post on SM’s future and then the interview with Venessa made me realize that I probably need to frame the story about “story” through the lens of the transformation we are going through post Gutenberg. And I’ll tell you, I struggled for the longest time with the term “social media.” I’m much more comfortable with it in this light.

Since I’m about twice as old as you I can completely relate to transformations that cost us old friends. My dear sweet wife still takes great comfort in the ritual that is “reading the daily paper.” I don’t know if you saw the story about Amazon signing Stephen Covey to an exclusive publishing contract, but that will go even further towards breaking down that institution.

You are anything but a thought-laggard. And be careful about kicking yourself in the ass. You could bruise yourself and the new wife might ask questions!

The transformation in publishing you speak of — saw today that the venerable Editor & Publisher is on its last legs and may not last another month. I don’t like transformations when we have to lose old friends like this. I think I’ve crossed the “old age” line where you go from leading the change to embracing comfort. Or perhaps it is the sheer rate of change that leaves me clinging to something, anything, familiar. Guess I better kick myself in the ass. Nobody wants to read a blog by a thought-laggard. : )