Author: Allegra

This is a Tiffany window from St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, ON, Phyllis’ church. I have seen it in person and it is magnificent.

Due to the service provider changeover, there was no frikkin coffee at work this morning! You should have heard the p*ssing and moaning! Finally a bunch of the new folks rushed around and got coffee happening on the separate floors. Fortunately, I have a friend named Tom, useful, intelligent, handsome, inventive Tom U., who by prior arrangement provided coffee at 8:20 this morning. As a special treat he gave me half of a sticky bun. Life is worth living.

Which reminds me, last night Katie said that the only good thing about winter is that I will start making cinnamon buns again.

I just deleted about ten paragraphs detailing my aches and pains, as they would be of no interest to anyone but me and would be actively embarrassing later. So I will announce to an uncaring world that I have no idea who won the debate, although I’m sure Wonkette will get her digs in, and that I think Eminem’s new song Just Lose It is one of the funniest and catchiest things I’ve heard in ages. The man’s a clown.

I imagine I’ll be blogging more over the next week as I have the week off. On the other hand, I may just go to bed for a week, the idea has polled very well in the target market. Paul’s off to Victoria for his course on the 7 pm ferry, I’m off to work; musical evening on Sunday for those interested. Mike may bring his new friend Victoria. We shall see. My mother had to have the Diebold ads explained to her. Don’t you wish you could live in her world? A world in which I didn’t have to know what Diebold was would be a truly cool thing. A guy went surfing with a whale the other day. Is this another sign of the apocalypse, or just a sign that juvenile whales are as playful and easily confused as other juvenile mammals? Paul’s mother turns 80 today. I think… or maybe it’s the 6th. Anyway, she’s more on the ball than I am, and has the advantage of knowing when her birthday is. Happy birthday Phyllis! Katie is learning how to do massage; might have something to do with how screwed up her shoulders and hands are (trading work). Her boyfriend has been sick and not at school. Her word for the subject is GRRRR. Writing is hard work, especially when you haven’t done any in years, so opineth Kate. Keith was very happy that his dad picked him up from Karate last night – nice to know people will do little things to care for you. I’m so bagged I can’t believe I still have an 8 hour shift to haul before I can collapse. Oh well, I’m off to the doc on Monday.

This is from the political humour centre on about.com. That’s a dangerous site, by the way…. there’s a LOT of stuff there.

 

PS about.com is now dotdash and basically doesn’t exist anymore (2019)

Jelly babies – planes up for sale at YVR. Yes, that is a very large building.

This cat is one of the most stunning I have ever seen. She’s as soft as a plush toy and quite self possessed. When I followed the “how to take a picture of animals” instructions and got down on her level she decided to investigate, and I quite like the expression on her face. She lives in Courtenay with my aunt and uncle; I got her name but in the really persistent brain fog it didn’t stick. That’s Mary’s head I managed to truncate in the background.

Here’s the reading:

2 Wands, 10 Wands, 5 Swords, King of Swords, the Hanged Man, Queen of Swords, 4 Wands, the Chariot, 10 Pentacles, Ace of Wands.

Despite all the sharp edges and blunt instruments, this is a good reading. You are a successful person with many burdens, and not an immediate prospect of putting all those burdens down. The 5 of Swords is a plea to either quit banging your head against the wall(!) or to guard against false pride, which I don’t think obtains in this case, though you should heed the warning. Who else could he be but the King of Swords, who is (in this case) “justice” without compassion? What else could the series of events represent but a sacrifice, emblemized by the Hanged Man? And who could you be but the Queen of Swords, sorrowing but sure to love again? The way those three cards were in sequence reminded me of what I love about the Tarot, the slashing economy of the images.

Happily the next card is the 4 of Wands; you will find yourself in a celebratory and peaceful and successful place. I looked to see the Chariot in this layout, and was not disappointed. It is two fold – it is a literal and figurative card. It’s about the car (a matter of some concern) and it’s about the embattled situation you find yourself in (controlling your impulses).

Your hopes and fears are exemplified by the 9 of Pentacles – the only money card in the layout. She is the gracious lady of the manor, her impulses well under control, her wealth and comfort and refinement obvious. Finally the Ace of Wands, a card of immense creative power.

Expect a flowering of creativity after a period of retrenchment and grief. The signs are favourable. Do not look for romance now – there are other concerns closer to hand.

CLUETRAIN

You don’t have to believe any of this… but I am a signatory of the Cluetrain Manifesto, because I actually believe most of this.

Markets are conversations.

Markets consist of human beings, not demographic sectors.

Conversations among human beings sound human. They are conducted in a human voice.

Whether delivering information, opinions, perspectives, dissenting arguments or humorous asides, the human voice is typically open, natural, uncontrived.

People recognize each other as such from the sound of this voice.

The Internet is enabling conversations among human beings that were simply not possible in the era of mass media.

Hyperlinks subvert hierarchy.

In both internetworked markets and among intranetworked employees, people are speaking to each other in a powerful new way.

These networked conversations are enabling powerful new forms of social organization and knowledge exchange to emerge.

As a result, markets are getting smarter, more informed, more organized. Participation in a networked market changes people fundamentally.

People in networked markets have figured out that they get far better information and support from one another than from vendors. So much for corporate rhetoric about adding value to commoditized products.

There are no secrets. The networked market knows more than companies do about their own products. And whether the news is good or bad, they tell everyone.

What’s happening to markets is also happening among employees. A metaphysical construct called “The Company” is the only thing standing between the two.

Corporations do not speak in the same voice as these new networked conversations. To their intended online audiences, companies sound hollow, flat, literally inhuman.

In just a few more years, the current homogenized “voice” of business—the sound of mission statements and brochures—will seem as contrived and artificial as the language of the 18th century French court.

Already, companies that speak in the language of the pitch, the dog-and-pony show, are no longer speaking to anyone.

Companies that assume online markets are the same markets that used to watch their ads on television are kidding themselves.

Companies that don’t realize their markets are now networked person-to-person, getting smarter as a result and deeply joined in conversation are missing their best opportunity.

Companies can now communicate with their markets directly. If they blow it, it could be their last chance.

Companies need to realize their markets are often laughing. At them.

Companies need to lighten up and take themselves less seriously. They need to get a sense of humor.

Getting a sense of humor does not mean putting some jokes on the corporate web site. Rather, it requires big values, a little humility, straight talk, and a genuine point of view.

Companies attempting to “position” themselves need to take a position. Optimally, it should relate to something their market actually cares about.

Bombastic boasts—”We are positioned to become the preeminent provider of XYZ”—do not constitute a position.

Companies need to come down from their Ivory Towers and talk to the people with whom they hope to create relationships.

Public Relations does not relate to the public. Companies are deeply afraid of their markets.

By speaking in language that is distant, uninviting, arrogant, they build walls to keep markets at bay.

Most marketing programs are based on the fear that the market might see what’s really going on inside the company.

Elvis said it best: “We can’t go on together with suspicious minds.”

Brand loyalty is the corporate version of going steady, but the breakup is inevitable—and coming fast. Because they are networked, smart markets are able to renegotiate relationships with blinding speed.

Networked markets can change suppliers overnight. Networked knowledge workers can change employers over lunch. Your own “downsizing initiatives” taught us to ask the question: “Loyalty? What’s that?”

Smart markets will find suppliers who speak their own language.

Learning to speak with a human voice is not a parlor trick. It can’t be “picked up” at some tony conference.

To speak with a human voice, companies must share the concerns of their communities.

But first, they must belong to a community.

Companies must ask themselves where their corporate cultures end.

If their cultures end before the community begins, they will have no market.

Human communities are based on discourse—on human speech about human concerns.

The community of discourse is the market.

Companies that do not belong to a community of discourse will die.

Companies make a religion of security, but this is largely a red herring. Most are protecting less against competitors than against their own market and workforce.

As with networked markets, people are also talking to each other directly inside the company—and not just about rules and regulations, boardroom directives, bottom lines.

Such conversations are taking place today on corporate intranets. But only when the conditions are right.

Companies typically install intranets top-down to distribute HR policies and other corporate information that workers are doing their best to ignore.

Intranets naturally tend to route around boredom. The best are built bottom-up by engaged individuals cooperating to construct something far more valuable: an intranetworked corporate conversation.

A healthy intranet organizes workers in many meanings of the word. Its effect is more radical than the agenda of any union.

While this scares companies witless, they also depend heavily on open intranets to generate and share critical knowledge. They need to resist the urge to “improve” or control these networked conversations.

When corporate intranets are not constrained by fear and legalistic rules, the type of conversation they encourage sounds remarkably like the conversation of the networked marketplace.

Org charts worked in an older economy where plans could be fully understood from atop steep management pyramids and detailed work orders could be handed down from on high.

Today, the org chart is hyperlinked, not hierarchical. Respect for hands-on knowledge wins over respect for abstract authority.

Command-and-control management styles both derive from and reinforce bureaucracy, power tripping and an overall culture of paranoia.

Paranoia kills conversation. That’s its point. But lack of open conversation kills companies.

There are two conversations going on. One inside the company. One with the market.

In most cases, neither conversation is going very well. Almost invariably, the cause of failure can be traced to obsolete notions of command and control.

As policy, these notions are poisonous. As tools, they are broken. Command and control are met with hostility by intranetworked knowledge workers and generate distrust in internetworked markets.

These two conversations want to talk to each other. They are speaking the same language. They recognize each other’s voices.

Smart companies will get out of the way and help the inevitable to happen sooner.

If willingness to get out of the way is taken as a measure of IQ, then very few companies have yet wised up.

However subliminally at the moment, millions of people now online perceive companies as little more than quaint legal fictions that are actively preventing these conversations from intersecting.

This is suicidal. Markets want to talk to companies.

Sadly, the part of the company a networked market wants to talk to is usually hidden behind a smokescreen of hucksterism, of language that rings false—and often is.

Markets do not want to talk to flacks and hucksters. They want to participate in the conversations going on behind the corporate firewall.

De-cloaking, getting personal: We are those markets. We want to talk to you.

We want access to your corporate information, to your plans and strategies, your best thinking, your genuine knowledge. We will not settle for the 4-color brochure, for web sites chock-a-block with eye candy but lacking any substance.

We’re also the workers who make your companies go. We want to talk to customers directly in our own voices, not in platitudes written into a script.

As markets, as workers, both of us are sick to death of getting our information by remote control. Why do we need faceless annual reports and third-hand market research studies to introduce us to each other?

As markets, as workers, we wonder why you’re not listening. You seem to be speaking a different language.

The inflated self-important jargon you sling around—in the press, at your conferences—what’s that got to do with us?

Maybe you’re impressing your investors. Maybe you’re impressing Wall Street. You’re not impressing us.

If you don’t impress us, your investors are going to take a bath. Don’t they understand this? If they did, they wouldn’t let you talk that way.

Your tired notions of “the market” make our eyes glaze over. We don’t recognize ourselves in your projections—perhaps because we know we’re already elsewhere.

We like this new marketplace much better. In fact, we are creating it.

You’re invited, but it’s our world. Take your shoes off at the door. If you want to barter with us, get down off that camel!

We are immune to advertising. Just forget it.

If you want us to talk to you, tell us something. Make it something interesting for a change.

We’ve got some ideas for you too: some new tools we need, some better service. Stuff we’d be willing to pay for. Got a minute?

You’re too busy “doing business” to answer our email? Oh gosh, sorry, gee, we’ll come back later. Maybe.

You want us to pay? We want you to pay attention.

We want you to drop your trip, come out of your neurotic self-involvement, join the party.

Don’t worry, you can still make money. That is, as long as it’s not the only thing on your mind.

Have you noticed that, in itself, money is kind of one-dimensional and boring? What else can we talk about?

Your product broke. Why? We’d like to ask the guy who made it. Your corporate strategy makes no sense. We’d like to have a chat with your CEO. What do you mean she’s not in?

We want you to take 50 million of us as seriously as you take one reporter from The Wall Street Journal.

We know some people from your company. They’re pretty cool online. Do you have any more like that you’re hiding? Can they come out and play?

When we have questions we turn to each other for answers. If you didn’t have such a tight rein on “your people” maybe they’d be among the people we’d turn to.

When we’re not busy being your “target market,” many of us are your people. We’d rather be talking to friends online than watching the clock. That would get your name around better than your entire million dollar web site. But you tell us speaking to the market is Marketing’s job.

We’d like it if you got what’s going on here. That’d be real nice. But it would be a big mistake to think we’re holding our breath.

We have better things to do than worry about whether you’ll change in time to get our business. Business is only a part of our lives. It seems to be all of yours. Think about it: who needs whom?

We have real power and we know it. If you don’t quite see the light, some other outfit will come along that’s more attentive, more interesting, more fun to play with.

Even at its worst, our newfound conversation is more interesting than most trade shows, more entertaining than any TV sitcom, and certainly more true-to-life than the corporate web sites we’ve been seeing.

Our allegiance is to ourselves—our friends, our new allies and acquaintances, even our sparring partners. Companies that have no part in this world, also have no future.

Companies are spending billions of dollars on Y2K. (Note, okay, this is old.) Why can’t they hear this market timebomb ticking? The stakes are even higher.

We’re both inside companies and outside them. The boundaries that separate our conversations look like the Berlin Wall today, but they’re really just an annoyance. We know they’re coming down. We’re going to work from both sides to take them down.

To traditional corporations, networked conversations may appear confused, may sound confusing. But we are organizing faster than they are. We have better tools, more new ideas, no rules to slow us down.

We are waking up and linking to each other. We are watching. But we are not waiting.

The road trip was exceptionally fine, with the exceptions hereafter noted; Granny, Mum, Auntie Mary, Aunt Diane, Jim, Jan, Carly, Jackie and Barry all came to the sermon and appeared to enjoy it; sloth and pride again took first and second for sins Unitarians consider their most besetting; and I will post a couple of pics.

Since a description of my digestive system’s aberrations during the trip up would be amusing but not uplifting, I will omit them; suffice to say those present were moved to be sympathetic, especially when I got a soaker coming back to the car from my impromptu commune with nature. Which reminds me, I still haven’t cleaned my shoes properly.

Paul claims I have previously had visual disturbances without headache with migraine – I certainly got them big time last night on the way back from the ferry but they were substantially cleared by the time I drove home. And yes, I shouldn’t have been driving while I was having visual disturbances, but Paul was too tired to drive.

Came home to find the lawns mowed, the kitchen immaculate, and the children asleep in their beds. Apart from screeching WHO ARE YOU and WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH MY BABIES, there was nothing to do but collapse.

Defining moment of my weekend: My mother falling on her knees in a Unitarian church, not in a sudden attack of religious feeling, but to inspect the altar hangings. Without question, the Comox Valley Unitarian Fellowship has the finest altar hangings it has ever been my privilege to see, and I am NOT posting a picture, first because hauling out a camera like a frikkin tourist is NOT on, and second because you’ll just have to go and see it. I suspect it’s one of those things that would be VERY hard to take a good picture of. Kids are now up and getting ready – I should clean my shoes and get out of here as well.

Foggy as the dickens this morning. Pics are possibly of the hyla, the ‘jelly babies’ or multicoloured aircraft outside the Air Canada Hangar at YVR, a detail of my rug, Jackie’s cats, and maybe musical evenings. It’ll be a hodgepodge.

Got up the highway okay; am now in Courtenay. My daysign, which I hope to post at some time soon, is a hyla, which we found in Jim and Jan’s yard. Talk to yall later.

Posting from my folks’ place; daysign three Stellar Jays, who are not designed to hang upside down, trying to get suet from the hanging suet cage. Hang, flap madly, right themselves, hang, flap madly, right themselves. Paul off to his class at Camosun College; he said he was a little anxious about it but I’m sure he’ll do fine. Off later to Comox to visit a small horde of relatives. Hoping to see Pagan and Eric – baby should have arrived or is about to – and will definitely see Jackie and Barry, Garry and Diane, Granny, Mary, and I guess I if I was sane I’d be phoning Jim and Jan and making sure they’re still expecting me, ha ha, otherwise I have to figure out where the hell I’ll be sleeping tonight. I will be delivering the sermon The Seven Deadly Sins Unitarian Style tomorrow at 4 pm at the Comox Valley Unitarian Fellowship, which meets in the United Church in Comox. I will, unfortunately, have to bail on the potluck supper and head straight down island for the ferry. Picture is of my mom, Mary and Barry when dinosaurs roamed the earth.