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Community and its absence

by Karoli on February 16, 2006

I just had the strangest experience. Actually, I’m still having it.

I was listening to the podcast of Nancy White’s session at Northern Voice. It was great. I could write a whole entry on it and maybe I will. But the weirdness is this:

When it was over and the applause faded, I felt strangely lonely. There was silence here. No people, no noise, just me, my computer, and my pug. No buzz of conversation afterward. I desperately wanted to be part of an “afterward conversation” because I felt so inspired.

It was weird. I’m about to turn on the news or something just for noise, because the silence is distracting and sad.

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  • I think you just pointed out one of the poignent things about this online/offline life. Just when we are in the flow of one, there is that jarring jump, that switch. Maybe making those switches gracefully is one of the competencies?

    I never logged on to the IRC channel at NVoice. That is one way to ease the transistions - the social "small talk" (though it is not small in its impact) can mediate the gap.

    Mind the gap, eh? :-)
  • Hi Alan!

    I'm a faithful subscriber to Nancy's blog. Love it! And you didn't have to add cheesy music...it was truly terrific that you recorded it and uploaded it for all of us as it was. It just really highlighted the failings that online media/community can have.

    When that session was over in real time, everyone moved on, or had drinks at the end of the day and shared the highlights. For ones listening after the fact, we learned a ton, but missed out on the community "unpacking" at the end of the day, and for some reason in this case, the silence was truly deafening.

    DnW
  • Sorry, we should have included some cheesy exit music ;-) It was a quick and dirty editing job an hour after the recording.

    I guess you are asking where do you go from here? I strongly recommend Nancy's own blog site. She has an amazing range of expertise wrapped in a friendly personality package.
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