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Cory Doctorow on Perfect Strangers

It’s worth noting for historical purposes that popular science fiction writer Cory Doctorow offered a capsule review of the 1980s Miller-Boyett sitcom Perfect Strangers:

The stories are read by Bronson Pinchot, whom you’ll remember from his role as “Balki” on the sitcom “Perfect Strangers.” This wasn’t the greatest TV ever produced, and Pinchot’s scenery-chewing comedy accent work was often over the top, but what little laughs Strangers evoked inevitably belonged to him.

Now we are so happy we do the Dance of Joy:

On Blog Comments

I changed the default theme of the blog and accidentally disabled commenting, and I think I’m going to leave it off for a while (or possibly permanently). 

I’ve considered removing the comments section for a while, but I hesitated because it seems unfriendly to speak without seeming to listen, and because there’s the Internet truism about building readership through community. 

But I’ve found that I’m hesitant to do the sort of personal writing that I want because I don’t want the comments. It isn’t that I don’t appreciate feedback from those of you who read the blog, but I’ve found that the prospect of comments on a piece dissuade me from publishing a piece more often than I like. 

This may be a quirk of my personality. I’ve always found it difficult to read feedback on my writing, and that may be part of my motivation. It’s also sometimes disheartening to spend hours on a piece, and then receive the first comment a few minutes after posting. For some of the things I write, I’d rather any response come after some deeper thought. If the piece doesn’t warrant any deeper thought, then silence can be the most honest feedback.

I’ve also noticed that my favorite conversations are not happening in other social media and not in blog comments. Google Buzz/Reader and Twitter are my usual online haunts, and I find the discussions there more interesting than the conversation on my own blog, even when the topic is my writing.

Maybe this is the difference between private and public space. No one really controls a Twitter conversation, but a blog comment is presumably directed toward the author. This is truer on a blog like mine than on a blog with a large readership, but I think that a commenter on a large blog writes with an eye toward the author, even when replying to another reader. This limits the dimension of conversation and ultimately makes it less fruitful.

Or it could be that the blog is actually semi-public space, where commenters address the author as an individual but the author addresses the commenters as a group.  Again we find a mismatch in conversational tone that limits the usefulness of the discussion, at least for me. I find that a private exchange is more profitable than one where I try to maintain an authorial voice.

And I do intend to maintain that voice on my blog. Sharpening my writing and thinking is the point of the blog for me, and it doesn’t profit me to drop into a different mode. 

So it comes down to a question of value. If the best conversation happens elsewhere, then it make sense to push that discussion off of my blog. Additionally, it’s much better for a writer to be talked about than talked to. If something I write really, truly strikes you, then share it with your friends or write about it on your own blog (where I suspect you’ll think deeper before posting than you would in my comments section).

Finally, if something I write makes you want to talk to me, then please send me an email. My contact information is posted for anyone who cares, and if by some miracle I gain so many readers that I can’t handle the email volume, then I can always enable comments.

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UPDATE: As an example, below is a link to a Google Reader/Buzz discussion of this blog post. It’s a much livelier discussion than you’ll see in most blogs’ comments:

https://profiles.google.com/Adam.Gurri/posts/D6snX2gS8eu

Passports, Diabetes, Poverty

BoingBoing posted these two maps comparing passport ownership for different US regions with prevalence of diabetes:

I thought I’d go one better. Here’s a poverty rate map:

It’s obviously no coincidence that our unhealthiest regions are often our poorest and that fewer people there are going to be interested in international travel.

Practical Advice

“Need to boil water? Cover the pot.

I know some of you are like, “A-duh,” but I didn’t know until about two years ago that a covered pot comes to boil much faster than an uncovered one.

see more tips from Cheap. Healthy. Good.

And no, I had no idea.

How to Fold a Fitted Sheet

Via Charlie Stross:

“Like any new thing you learn, it might feel awkward at first.”

A Word on Egypt (but not mine).

From a good friend’s Facebook status:

“I hope every parent in Cairo takes their child to Tahrir Square tonight. One of the best things my parents ever did for me was to take me to the Opera Square in Timisoara the day Ceausescu ran away. It’s a once in a lifetime chance to see what collective effervescence really feels like.”

Once in several lifetimes, I think. I’m humbled every day by the people I’m privileged enough to call my friends.

Batman and Robin

via Tor.com

(Source: tor.com)

Brief Review: Temple Grandin

I’ve been interested in animal behaviorist (and slaughterhouse designer) Temple Grandin since I first read about her in Oliver Sacks’s An Anthropologist on Mars, and last night we finally watched last year’s HBO film about her. 

The script does a good job, but it’s pretty biopic-y, and I was annoyed by the extended “door opening” metaphor. On the plus side, Claire Danes gives a performance that manages to accurately mimic Grandin without losing the emotional truth of the character.

The best part is that the film really celebrates smart, strong women- not only Grandin, but also her mother and aunt. You can bet that I’ll show it to my daughters when they’re old enough to understand it.