Now, I have a theoretical question: if I start arguing about what you wrote, choosing the Iznogud option, for instance, you reply, and we enter into a heated disagreement, in which group category do we fall? All three, presumably? In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
(Sorry, Migeru - this is just a joke) In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
It happens at dKos with troll rating wars. Sometimes I see it happen here in diaries with high quantity of comments and with low content contribution to the original diary. Want to fight? Write your own diary and open the discussion ...
I don't see a group process at ET, very similar to troubles of cohesion in the EU. Each writer has his/her own bigotry, the bloggers at ET will keep the extremes within check and everyone will have a lot of freedom in expression of ideas and be able to contribute to a great site.
Attack Jérôme and other frontpagers? Sure, they are human like us aren't they.
"Treason doth never prosper: what's the reason? For if it prosper, none dare call it treason."
▼▼▼ READ MY DIARY ▼
Compared to so many other blogs, though, ET seems to be doing a fantastic job of keeping the debate on a civilized and informative level. I am not sure what "work" we have to do, (I think there is a nice balance of informing, discussing policy and just having euro-centric fun); I don't find anything to worry about.
And about Jerome. I think it's ultimately his job to defend his honor. I think it's the responsibility of the rest of us to make sure this doesn't become a temple of worship to the French banker. Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. -Voltaire
Don't ask a mere refugee from the house of Orange, bobbing in the flood, pages of the New York Review held aloft as sails, tattered Kropotkin under my arm, ears still ringing from the incessant blare of the giant Armandophone. (Oh, There's more all right. Always so much more.) Such a homey little place, all warm and cozy, until they all came.
If you have nothing in common you can't communicate... even to disagree. Most economists teach a theoretical framework that has been shown to be fundamentally useless. -- James K. Galbraith
Seriously, though, this is all really good information to bear in mind. That said, there's really no way around this stuff -- it's human nature. As long as we communicate, we're going to have conflicts, even if no one means to.
Whether we learn from the conflict is up to each of us. This is not to say we should like conflict, but it's unavoidable at times. That it happens doesn't mean much -- how we handle it is what counts. Diaries like this one are an excellent way to make sure conflicts don't render the group dysfunctional. Thanks. Maybe we can eventually make language a complete impediment to understanding. -Hobbes
I like very much your diary..not only becaue what it says but because it seems that you always keep in the background this famous sentence of Feynmann...:
"..and for all these reason (after half hour of reasons) we can cleary make an association between mathematics and literature, two forms of art,two languages... having said that, this analogy is completely useless becausee I can relate any two pair of things that you want any time you want and stablish beatiful association."
And even if you did not know the anecdote.. you always keep it in mind...
Great.
A pleasure I therefore claim to show, not how men think in myths, but how myths operate in men's minds without their being aware of the fact. Levi-Strauss, Claude
naaahhh!!!
I kept my two options.
ET is a forum for finding out - more than anything else that it might be. If one is an avid reader with plenty of spare time, one can find out almost anything these days. It's all out there.
But with limited time, one likes to get a quick taster of new information. I use several forums - I wish there was just one, but it is unlikely that anyone out there shares my exact mix of interests. ET offers the strangest mix of all these, and also has the strangest group dynamics because the membership cuts across so many nationalities, professions and interests. It is what I find most interesting - what is the glue that holds it alltogether? It is a microcosm of the planet's most difficult problem.
That said, I probably spend most time at a Finnish chat of weirdos, mostly because they are night-owls like me. I like chat because it is ephemeral. Threads are there for all to see, long after the mood is gone. You can't be me, I'm taken
Maybe you mean one should take a position based on what you know you don't know? I don't know what I would call that exactly, maybe "Socratic", but definitely nor "informed".
Yesterday Colman took a position on Russia based on what he did not know he did not know, which is even better: it's truly open-minded.
I'm beginning to sound like Donald Rumsfeld:
Reports that say that something hasn't happened are always interesting to me, because as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns -- the ones we don't know we don't know.
Is that true for anti-fascists? *Traitor*, n. A benighted individual who perceives an illusory distinction between serving his nation and abetting the criminals who govern it.
I'm not sure though that I'd like to belong to any category that would have me - to misquote Marx (You know which one) You can't be me, I'm taken
Go into any real workplace (presumably the locus of "Work mode") (or any historical description of such) and you'll find all three modes in full flow. As Izzy notes, to be human is to love, fight and jockey in the hierarchy.
I'd like to approach this from my experiences in Scoop sites (which is very long but undistinguished) but I need to get to work.
I will instead observe that this looks (no offence intended) very much like the typical physicists cry of anguish when faced with a system whose purpose is not only ill-defined, but perhaps purposely diffuse.
I think that whilst the discussions of bias/bigotism may be distracting at times, they are a necessary component of democracy. Further, the big issue underlying all this is "What is ET for? What are we acheiving/going to acheive?" I don't think you, Migeru, are at heart happy with the current vision...
Fuzziness means there are multiple 'right' choices. Fuzziness is the entire scope of human interaction in the no-man's land between the polar opposites of belief and science. You can't be me, I'm taken
To me, this is a big experiment. Ther's the precedent os dKos, and the more recent one of Booman's, but both are American and fairly focused on political issues. This is a multinational (if not -yet?- multilingual) site with, from the start, a fairly wide range of topics - with a slight focus on energy issues and elections around Europe. It will grow from people that are attracted by what they find, but add their own ingredients to the "soup". So far it's been a pretty gratifying process.
One question: are the "high standards" of discourse linked to the wonkiness of the topics and the commenters? i.e. would they be threatened if we manage (as has been requested) to increase the proportion of lighter content? In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
wonky Chiefly British 1. Shaky; feeble. 2. Wrong; awry. Probably alteration of dialectal wanky, alteration of wankle, from Middle English wankel, from Old English wancol, unsteady.
Wonk was originally a 1960s slang word applied to an excessively studious person (equivalent to "grind" or "nerd"). The origins of the term are obscure. It has been described as a simple reversal of "know," linked to an obscure Old English word, and attributed to Royal Navy slang for a learned but inexperienced midshipman.
But there is a difference. ET has all of these things together on the same page, so it is sometimes difficult to work out the intended audience and purpose (me guilty aussi)
I wonder if there is some way of broadly categorizing diaries according to intention. I could imagine (off the top of my head) that if it was possible to choose a colour instead of blue for the headline of one's diary, one could differentiate and signal to potential readers.
What might those categories might be? Politics, Economics, Personal, Humour, Society.
Just a suggestion... You can't be me, I'm taken
SCOOP sites have a critical size beyond which you have to start restricting traffic (as DKos does) and user behaviour starts revolving around having your diaries recommended (as the only way to have them read at all).
That is the critical mass I worry about. Most economists teach a theoretical framework that has been shown to be fundamentally useless. -- James K. Galbraith
Rousseau made a great deal of it in his Social Contract:
I shall take as an example the number of a people, which is the most easily expressible. Suppose the State is composed of ten thousand citizens. The Sovereign can only be considered collectively and as a body; but each member, as being a subject, is regarded as an individual: thus the Sovereign is to the subject as ten thousand to one, i.e., each member of the State has as his share only a ten-thousandth part of the sovereign authority, although he is wholly under its control. If the people numbers a hundred thousand, the condition of the subject undergoes no change, and each equally is under the whole authority of the laws, while his vote, being reduced to a hundred-thousandth part, has ten times less influence in drawing them up. The subject therefore remaining always a unit, the relation between him and the Sovereign increases with the number of the citizens. From this it follows that, the larger the State, the less the liberty. When I say the relation increases, I mean that it grows more unequal. Thus the greater it is in the geometrical sense, the less relation there is in the ordinary sense of the word. In the former sense, the relation, considered according to quantity, is expressed by the quotient; in the latter, considered according to identity, it is reckoned by similarity. Now, the less relation the particular wills have to the general will, that is, morals and manners to laws, the more should the repressive forcebe increased. The government, then, to be good, should be proportionately stronger as the people is more numerous. On the other hand, as the growth of the State gives the depositaries of the public authority more temptations and chances of abusing their power, the greater the force with which the government ought to be endowed for keeping the people in hand, the greater too should be the force at the disposal of the Sovereign for keeping the government in hand. I am speaking, not of absolute force, but of the relative force of the different parts of the State.
Suppose the State is composed of ten thousand citizens. The Sovereign can only be considered collectively and as a body; but each member, as being a subject, is regarded as an individual: thus the Sovereign is to the subject as ten thousand to one, i.e., each member of the State has as his share only a ten-thousandth part of the sovereign authority, although he is wholly under its control. If the people numbers a hundred thousand, the condition of the subject undergoes no change, and each equally is under the whole authority of the laws, while his vote, being reduced to a hundred-thousandth part, has ten times less influence in drawing them up. The subject therefore remaining always a unit, the relation between him and the Sovereign increases with the number of the citizens. From this it follows that, the larger the State, the less the liberty.
When I say the relation increases, I mean that it grows more unequal. Thus the greater it is in the geometrical sense, the less relation there is in the ordinary sense of the word. In the former sense, the relation, considered according to quantity, is expressed by the quotient; in the latter, considered according to identity, it is reckoned by similarity.
Now, the less relation the particular wills have to the general will, that is, morals and manners to laws, the more should the repressive forcebe increased. The government, then, to be good, should be proportionately stronger as the people is more numerous.
On the other hand, as the growth of the State gives the depositaries of the public authority more temptations and chances of abusing their power, the greater the force with which the government ought to be endowed for keeping the people in hand, the greater too should be the force at the disposal of the Sovereign for keeping the government in hand. I am speaking, not of absolute force, but of the relative force of the different parts of the State.
As democracies grow, ET being a community blogs with comments and diaries desingned to be a community rather than a platform, the require more instruments of control. This is why Rousseau felt that the democracies needed to be small in order to work, and in the American experience this is much of the reason for the fixation on subsidiarity and federalism.
There was a belief in the 90's that the Internet could transcend that through instant communication that enables communities to form and disband at will. Advocacy of the dissolution of the "State" is a crime in many countries. Sedition is regular practice on the internet. In no small part ET and Booman are the creation of people who choose to vote with their feet and form new communities.
That does not by neccesity mean treason. I'm going to put forward a different idea. As the internet grows, the profusion of groups in which people are active has become a civil society, which is characterestic of a meodern pluralistic dmeocracy that has made its peace with the realization that with size direct democracy becomes damn near immossible.
As Kos, the House of Orange, as Melvin put it, grows will people still feel like participating in front page threads that have 2500 comments. Is it humanly possible to compehend the conversation at that level. Or will this result in the formation of specialized communities that have leaders chosen by consensus that state the opinions of the interested group.
How any of you have gone over to Kos to give Jerome a hand, or to give a recommend to Chris or me?
So what you have is a situation in which groups within the State (in this case Kos, the blogfather) which form pressure groups and participatory organization, ie civil society. While there are aggravations I think this is a sign of something deeply positive, where civil society has largely been in decline in Western Europe and the US, on the internet its growing at an expotential rate. And I'll give my consent to any government that does not deny a man a living wage-Billy Bragg
Which is a certain sense makes Daily Kos into the "State" and Kos, the leader.
ET is not only a forum for European affairs but also world affairs, and because of Jerome for energy. Jerome will oftern crosspost, and it's interesting to ask to what extent Jerome's posts are the product of conversations that go on here at ET.
To a lesser extent, Chris and I have done the same types of things with diaries on Latin America.
How many of the diaries on Latin America and energy would exist without the work of ET as a "thinktank" and a presure group to force them into the attention of of Kossacks?
On any blog you have groups of people who are interedted in a topic, and can swoop in en masse an propel that onto the recommended diaries list, or draw inerest through making comments (do you read the dairies with zero comments if you dont' like the title?)
As ET grows will the fracturing that Kos has seen occur on national lines. ET desires to be a mutlilingual community, but in the absence of more effective auto translation software that's a very hard task.
Would such a development be bad? If ET spawned dependent communities that used French, German, or Spanish as the operation language, would the conseguence be that readers in those communities bring stories to ET that the language barrier would normally prevent?
Without ou posting about the comments about the "Saber rattling in Spain" would there have been a diary on this topic, or would it have slipped under the radar? And I'll give my consent to any government that does not deny a man a living wage-Billy Bragg
Fracturing isn't the right word.
Can you be feel identity with ET, DailyKos, and Booman? Yes.
Does being an active participant in one community mean that you're not acive in the others? No.
Is there, or should there be a firewall seperating content?
Too what extent should content be chanelled into specific categories? For example, I often crosspost on Kos, Booman, ET, and My Left Wing. I can think of only a few times when I thought my writing was off topic, and I shouldn't crosspost. For instance the piece i wrote on the American legal concept that corporations have rights because they are "people", this I did not crosspost. When I write on the internal politics of Spain, I rarely crosspost from ET to Kos, what are or should be the limits? And I'll give my consent to any government that does not deny a man a living wage-Billy Bragg
I came to ET though Jerome's signature as seen in Jerome's posts at DKos. I don't see ET as a political faction operating inside the DKos "state": I don't feel bound to help Jerome increase ET's visibility on DKos. ET has staked a claim on a different portion of the Blogosphere. I am more concerned about capturing the rest of the European internet users who are not fluent in English.
My idea of multi-lingualism on ET does not involve separate sites cross-posting English-language diaries on the main site, either. This is a topic I have discussed with Jerome in disconnected comments over the last two months or so. Maybe I'm ready for a meta-diary on that.
My diary on Sabre rattling in Spain is relevant to ET, hopelessly off-topic on DKos. Most economists teach a theoretical framework that has been shown to be fundamentally useless. -- James K. Galbraith
DKos is explicitly about Democratic Party strategy, policy and advocacy. I am afraid my position in US politics is outside the Democratic party (and I am not talking about the ideological spectrum: I lived in the US for just under 5 years and was as politically involved as my non-resident immigrant status allowed). Hence I am not really at home discussing things on DKos, since the "framing" feels off. I can leave that to Jerome or Chris, who do feel at home. I also don't feel it is right for me to exercise my voting rights on DKos, as it would just distort ratings and recommendations. Not being a physical community, I am not stuck with DKos as my only outlet (as I am stuck with my Spanish nationality whether or not I feel Spain is the proper constituency for me).
Whoa, this is already too long and rambling... Let's let it stand. Most economists teach a theoretical framework that has been shown to be fundamentally useless. -- James K. Galbraith
That's the world as viewed by Americans, not vice versa. *Traitor*, n. A benighted individual who perceives an illusory distinction between serving his nation and abetting the criminals who govern it.
That was before the so-called Pie Wars exodus from dKos. Well, it still remains less crowded. The world's northernmost desert wind.
I think a Continental languages box, like the world diaries box on Booman is overdue. The idea of having multilingualism is both attractive and somewhat off putting. I'd like to put my less than perfect Spanish into practice with Spanish who might not feel comfortable communicating in English, yet at the same time I don't speak French or German which will most likely be the languages most used in any box like this.
Also is European Tribune specifically a European site? Are posts about Latin America approriate? Is the American (US) contingent here welcome? And I'll give my consent to any government that does not deny a man a living wage-Billy Bragg
I'm not sure what a front pager looks like, but I've always imagined you must look something like this:
Smile Colman it's a joke. But seriously, where's the pot of gold? And I'll give my consent to any government that does not deny a man a living wage-Billy Bragg
Put up a thread, and make the question simple I would participate in diaries written in........
French German Spanish Italian Russian Polish
Etc.
This could get an idea of the number of lurkers who read but are afraid to comment in English. And I'll give my consent to any government that does not deny a man a living wage-Billy Bragg
Separation should not be done by poster, but by language (maybe a pull-down menu in the diary editing page?), and only if warranted by the traffic in that language.
Initially one could separate English and non-English. Most economists teach a theoretical framework that has been shown to be fundamentally useless. -- James K. Galbraith
Personally, I have very little use for the front page. I use the recent comments link and the diaries list on the right-hand side.
The front page is the image we want to present to newcomers, not to regulars. That is what makes front-pagers important, and why their ability to front-page other people's diaries is more useful than their ability to post directly to the front page (they can always promote each other). Most economists teach a theoretical framework that has been shown to be fundamentally useless. -- James K. Galbraith
Something that I can agree with.
This is less true here at ET, but I'd say absolulely true over and Daily Kos. And I'll give my consent to any government that does not deny a man a living wage-Billy Bragg
The problem with the National Security State, or with Theocracy, is that in those cases the Security Apparatus or the Church completely swamp the "sophisticated" group operations.
Bion is not a dilettante, he's a psychoanalyst, which means his reasoning is very fuzzy and ultimately unscientific. To me, as a physicist, his book was intriguing but hard to boil down to a few concepts that one can develop logically. But that's quite all-right.
I think you misinterpret me. To me, this diary is an attempt to move beyond my physicist's anguish at the lat of well-defined purpose, by accepting that the diffuse purposed are just the way that human groups operate. Human nature, like Izzy said. Most economists teach a theoretical framework that has been shown to be fundamentally useless. -- James K. Galbraith
As for ET, I can say from my perspective that there has been an intention to create a community...but can an open source community truly be "created", or does it self select and develop on its on in time? In another area of group dynamics, it is also recognized that at the beginning of any new group, there needs to be more structure and guidance or leadership, because otherwise the group becomes an anxious experience, and people will find that aversive and leave. Once there is a sense of structure and safety, then there is more spontaneous involvement by the group, and less structure and guidance is needed. But what about in an open group, where people are coming and going, where the dynamic keeps changing?
I used to run a residential program years ago, in the San Francisco community mental health system for people with severe mental health problems. That program had a rotating residency...so people came and went every 3 months...and on occasion we would have 12 people who had schizophrenic diagnoses...and sometimes to get them to relate to each other, the two group leaders had to sit and let the tension and anxiety build up, until someone started talking...when to talk? When to sit and wait, was always a challenge. Half the population is under the age of 18. Tanzania's future is NOW...join the 50% campaign!
We have definitely had both online and behind the scenes discussions about commuity and dynamics. We haven't really come to any final conclusions, more of an ongoing dialogue...I do notice that most of the people who started here have tended to stay around, or at least lurk (and actually, lately I have been more of a lurking front pager!). ET has steadily grown in six months, that's a fact. I attribute that to a combination of this community mostly being quite welcoming, being quite diverse and interesting...and because Jerome has worked his butt off writing regular diaries at Dkos and Boman, which have drawn in many new readers...including the regular media. Jerome has definite editorial control, though he rarely asserts it, and never in my experience unfairly. He's a "good enough" leader <heh>...he lets us play...as long as we are cool, and there's a conversation between us if something isn't right (in his book, or in our book...).
So how does that fit? Half the population is under the age of 18. Tanzania's future is NOW...join the 50% campaign!
Arthur Koestler in his book on creativity (from which I paraphrase frequently) talked about Matrix Collisions. In it's simplest form - a joke - the joke preamble always sets you up in a matrix or microcosm such as: there was an ETer, A BTer and a Kossak in a bar...
The punch line always flips you into another similar but incompatible matrix. The conscious brain - always trying to dumbly make sense of everything - searches for a way to reconcile this collision like a thermostat hunting for stasis. But accepts defeat in laughter. Trompe L'oeuil does similar things via the Visual Projection System.
The interesting apart of this though, on which Koestler expands, is that this attempted reconcilement of overlaid and incompatible matrices is at the base of our interface with all art.
Dealing with this every day can make one a little skittish at times ;-) You can't be me, I'm taken
It has some stable voices who provide the group with a very general direction but there are lots of other conversations going on as well. They are much appreciated.
It has regular members who have found their own niches and their own styles. They are much appreciated.
It is slowly growing and more diaries have other commentators and not just the same voices. This is healthy. They are much appreciated and we hope they come back.
It has a clear civil mode of discourse that sets it apart from many other blogs. That is one of the refreshing things about it. It is rarely just bash, bash, bash; much more often it is read, consider, think a little write, (every once in a while maybe rant a bit and acknowledge the rant), and repeat.
We may be getting close enough of a critical mass to begin doing some things in addition to what goes on now. We'll see.
By the way I figure I knew what all the "snark" references were these past few months but now that I've looked it up in Wikipedia I wonder if I've been interpreting snarks correctly:
This word has Germanic origins and is etymologically unrelated to the imaginary creature in Lewis Carroll's The Hunting of the Snark. [edit]
Is this definition correct? What does snark mean here?
I hope your thanks were not intended snarcastically.
Now it is altogether much funnier... ;-) You can't be me, I'm taken
Are we:
a) An arid humourless bunch b) Averse to acronyms c) Uninterested in the evolution of language d) Not the back slapping kind e) Unaware of what LOL is
Interestingly you see it a lot at BT. Perhaps its a peculiarly American colloquialism? (Though I see it in Finnish language chats - the direct translation would be NÄ = nauraa äänella = Laughing Out Loud.
How would you translate this acronym into your language - if your first language is not English? You can't be me, I'm taken
It is handy - you can type faster in an on-line discussion, and these acronyms have certain emoticon value. (Remember that the first non-techie internet communities originated dominated by university students and teachers - not a lowbrow community.) *Traitor*, n. A benighted individual who perceives an illusory distinction between serving his nation and abetting the criminals who govern it.
Helvetiin pilkkunussijat! o/
Personally I use a lot of shrtcts, being a major SMSer.
Happily the English language is alive and evolving. Who says the Tottenham Hotspur Football Club today? We say Spurs. As long as most everyone understands, language - spoken or written - is a service, not a museum.
ROTFL You can't be me, I'm taken
I also note the use of 'single' quotes to qualify words, titles etc. Officially the single quote is used to identify a 'quote' within a "quote" but you can find the single quote even on BBC website.
Less standardised is the identification of asides or 'thinks'. Some people use <snark> and <takes head out of bucket>, to add stage instructions to their comments. Others use the asterisk Hmmm
But as you can see, unusual punctuation can also trigger software to do funny things. The bold hmmm was triggered by the use of an asterisk in front of it. There was also an asterisk afterwards which shut off the bold. (Undocumented features of Scoop I guess)
My favourite (and Colman will turn in his office chair when he sees it) is the use of three dots to indicate that a reply is expected, or that I have more to say, but maybe you'd like to say something first... You can't be me, I'm taken
