Month: February 2009

Announcing my full participation in Twitter

/ Eamon / 2 Comments

So apparently Twitter is the next big thing, blah blah blah yakkity smakkity.

I must admit that I still don’t REALLY get the effin point. Seems like the ultimate in sound bytes, and unless you’re in a plane crash or being held hostage by terrorists, who the hell really cares what you have to say in 140 characters? And why can’t you say it via email, regular blogging or a text message to your brohamskis?

But I don’t want to be left out of the loop. So I’ve started using Twitter. I’m using it mostly for little haiku-ish revelations that I’m having during the day–the kind of things we all have, every day–and feeding it to the right-hand side of this blog. Here’s the pure RSS feed.

I’m actually finding it a pleasurable way to keep a little journal. Any medium that has clear boundaries is fun to be creative with–funny in that way that rules and structure can be a good basis for freedom. I guess that’s the philosophy behind the haiku and any other fixed-form poem.

Anyway, I hope this provides you a modicum of extra Net enjoyment.

Taking the Darfur discussion to the next level

/ Eamon / Leave a comment

If you want deeper discussions on all Darfur-related matters (especially the ICC indictment of Omar al-Bashir) you have to add this baby to your RSS feeds: Making Sense of Darfur, started by Darfur expert Alex de Waal. If you’re a Save Darfur member and you’re not engaged in these discussions, well, you should be ashamed of yourself! The thoughtfulness of some of the posts on this blog puts some of my more energetic rants to shame. (Not that I ever get my facts wrong. Ever.)

Also, if you’ve got suggestions for other thoughtful or definitive blogs on Darfur or Sudan that you think are worth following, I’d love to hear them. I’m trying to make Sudan part of my daily readings.

The anti-ethicist: Drive Noah Drive

/ Eamon / 1 Comment

You know Randy Cohen’s column “The Ethicist” in The New York Times? The one where people write in with mundane but ethically puzzling problems, to find out the right thing to do?

The column gives you that comforting, whole feeling when you’re done reading, a feeling where you go, Oh, good, with the necessary tools you can figure out what’s right and wrong in just about any situation.

Trouble is, try to apply that kind of rubric to real life, and letting “ethics” rule your existence turns out to be cumbersome, confusing, miserable, exhausting and — when it comes down to it — damn near impossible.

That’s where DriveNoahDrive comes in. Continue reading →