

Rands In Repose: A Story Culture - filament
http://www.randsinrepose.com/archives/2010/02/08/a_story_culture.html

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yannis
Culture is becoming nothing but advertising. The anthropologist Steve Barnett
saw in this the phenomenon of pattern exhaustion, in which a culture runs out
of variations of traditional designs in their pottery and become less
creative.

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diN0bot
The trick is that wisdom can often be expressed by the wise in 140 characters,
and the non-wise can recognize it as wisdom, but to truly understand requires
far more subtly than 140 characters.

even a good discussion is only so useful for exploring nuance, subtly and
balance. at some point experience is all there is, and communication is more
about mentoring and guiding.

can two people even truly communicate? can we even share?

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epochwolf
Given the relationship I have with one of my closest friends I think it's
possible for two people to truly communicate. We don't complete each other's
sentences just yet. Give us 20 years together and we probably will. My
grandparents can do that.

I don't think it's worthwhile to look for meaning in twitter messages. A mere
140 characters isn't enough to have a deep discussion but it might have some
insight. I get more from discussing my insight with friends than I do looking
for it on twitter. Wisdom takes time.

Edit: removed a paragraph that wasn't needed

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mreid
I don't doubt that close friends are an invaluable source of meaning but I
think you may have missed the point of Rand's post.

I'm pretty sure he is not arguing that there is deep wisdom to be found in 140
characters. Rather, through your interaction with many tweets from many people
you can distil meaning.

 _The point of Twitter isn’t knowledge or understanding, it’s merely
connective information tissue. It’s small bits of information carefully
selected by those you’ve chosen to follow and its value isn’t in what they
send, it’s how it fits into the story in your head. There are great stories to
be found on Twitter, but you have to do the work._

You're not precluded from discussing tweets with your friend.

~~~
epochwolf
I think I may be using a different definition for meaning. I equate meaning to
wisdom rather than information or knowledge.

I don't think twitter has much wisdom to offer. It has starting points for
valuable thoughts from time to time. Which I see as the the point of the
article.

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TobiasCassell
"The value of the idea is one part that it is yours and one part that you gave
it to someone else. It’s you and something new."

I loved this..

