David Weinberger's speech on his book Everything is Miscellaneous is excellent. His discussion is basically on the theoretical aspects of the stuff being discovered and examined practically by people and companies in the digital space and digital era that has prompted vicious [1] new ideas like The Long Tail and Wikiality [2]. Neat stuff and useful to kind of expand your horizons on knowledge of er... knowledge.
Here's the kicker that really connected a couple of dots that I don't think I had yet: the tools we are building in this digital age (tags, folksonomies, et al) and the links we are building between sources of data and the tools we are much more slowly building to make use of that huge amount of wild, unmanageable data: we are slowly creating the amazing ability to externalize and enrich meaning outside of our own heads. This is an amazing conclusion and one that seems to beg for much more thought... [3]
On a bit of tangent, albeit perhaps ironically dumped into this generally miscellaneous post... Here a few notes from my mental local fast food database that someone may find useful: The central station Quiznos had a new management sign which makes that second I've seen since it has been there. The J. Gumbo's local chain has very quickly impressed me. I'd been meaning to try it since it was named Gumbo A Go Go and only in Crescent Hill, but the chain seems to have hit something of a stride. The central station location is really nice. I like it's particularly Fast/Casual balance, plus the fact that it is a Fast Casual non-Pizza place that delivers. Even more impressive, I checked out the 4th Street Live location... It is three doors down from the Hard Rock Cafe, right across from the T. G. I. Friday's and looks like it belongs there. I'm betting it costs an arm and leg to run, but from a new franchise in the making it is a really cool power move. I'm sure it is getting plenty of tourist eyeballs. At this point I'm expecting J. Gumbo's to be the next to add to the long list of strong franchises with a Louisville-connection...
| [1] | In the memetic virology sense. |
| [2] | Another of the many Colbertisms that has such general usefulness: the idea that Wikis are a very interesting projection of Reality because they are built from a consensual view of Reality... To save some people a google search: The Wonderfully Recursive Definition of Wikiality from Wikiality, the Truthiness Encyclopedia |
| [3] | To Carl Sagan some of the major steps in Human evolution thus far revolve around the externalization of knowledge. It is a useful way to point at key changes in what Humanity is. That was before any modern notions of Memetics, too. |