Japi's Blog

Vote for South by SouthWest 2008 Panels

We usually send several people from our office to South by SouthWest (SXSW) in Austin every year.  We are hoping to have our CEO, Ed Schipul, be on one or more panels at SXSW 2008.

If you are reading this blog, I would really appreciate your help in getting his panels selected for next year's event.  If you want to help, please follow these steps:

1. Create an account on the SXSW Panel Picker site (it's free)
2. Go to the Panel Picker page and do a search for these panels:

• We Heart You!! -- Growing Your Business From Within (vote)
  Your employees are your company's heart and soul -- do they know how much you love them? Our discussion will give you some insights on how to improve the lives and brains of your greatest assets, giving you a strong competitive edge and a win-win environment for your company, your employees and your clients.
• iPhone in the Enterprise (vote)
  The iPhone hit the cell phone market by storm in mid 2007. A phone to solve your every need. And one heck of a new user interface paradigm focused on your fingers as an input device. No more windows, only view ports. The Safari browser and Webkit became relevant again. We're giving away an actual iPhone at this panel, so come ready with questions and ideas.
• Pimp My Non Profit (vote)
  Non profit groups struggle with funding and public support issues on a daily basis. Yet many have overcome the odds and made a splash online and offline by using the latest Web technologies -- for pennies on the dollar. This discussion will center around the stories, strategies, triumphs and challenges of innovative non profits with a passion for change and the cajones to rock it out online.
• The Art of Visual Thinking (vote)
  Kelsey’s panel - Visual Thinking is the art of using pictures to solve problems, think through issues and communicate messages clearly. Visual communication has long been used by indigenous cultures in art, storytelling and history. This has helped shape languages and communication styles around the world. Find out how to present ideas visually, cut through the clutter to help explain things in a more concise and understandable manner.

I very much appreciate your help with this... I know it's somewhat of a shameless plug, but I am certain many of the SXSW attendees will learn a bunch from Ed - he's a phenomenal and knowledgeable speaker.

A Brave Young Man's Blog

Miles Levin started a blog in 2005 to celebrate life, as a horrible form of cancer killed him.  I read an article on CNN.com about this valiant young man who passed away Sunday, he was 18 years old (6 days before his 19th birthday). 

Visit Miles Levin's blog (the site will prompt you to create a free account before you can view the blog)

At one point he wrote "that cancer and the fear of death could expand your heart and mind"... he contracted was pediatric cancer called alveolar rhabdomyosarcoma and was an amazing and impactful young man in the last few years of his life.

When he graduated from high school a few months ago, he realized that this would be his final milestone in life and wrote: "I can rest assured that even if I succumb to the rogue cells, I will leave behind a legacy of victory."

"Dying is not what scares me; it's dying having had no impact. I know a lot of eyes are watching me suffer; and -- win or lose -- this is my time for impact."

I can't imagine experiencing life and death the way this young man did, and I don't know if I would be as brave as he was... but I salute and pray for him as he is now in the hands of God.

Miles, thank you for showing us how to live with your heart filled with life.

The "UJF Miles Levin Fund," a tax-exempt fund, has been established to support efforts to combat pediatric cancer and allow the Levin family to work toward new directions in patient care.

UJF - Miles Alpern Levin Fund
P.O. Box 2030
Bloomfield Hills, MI 48303
Attn: Susie Feldman

Messages of condolence may be mailed to his family,

Nancy, Jon and Nina Levin
1768 Shaker Heights Drive
Bloomfield Hills, MI 48304

BloggerCon at the ASAE Conference 2007

Ben Martin from Virginia Association of Realtors organized a sub-meeting at the ASAE Conference 2007 in Chicago and called it Association Bloggercon 2007.  The idea behind this meeting was to share ideas on how to blog better and reach our intended audiences.

We had abouit 30+folks there and the conversation was very active.  Some of the people in attendance included:

1. Zach Wilson principal at Gulo Customized Internet Solutions - link to Gulo Solution's blog
2. Greg Fine, CAE of Association Forum of Chicagoland
3. Jeff De Cagna from Principled Innovation - link to Principled Innovation's blog
4. Jason Alba, CEO of JibberJobber - link to JibberJobber's blog
5. Sue Pelletier, editor of The Meetings Group - link to Face2Face blog
6. C. David Gammel of High Context Consulting - link to High Context's blog
7. Jason Della Rocca, Executive Director of International Game Developers Association - link to Reality Panic

Many others attended, but I didn't have the opportunity to get their information.  If anyone reading this blog-post attended and would like to be included in it, please submit a comment with your information... I will update the post with it.

The meeting was divided into two conversations:

First we talked about how to get leaders of associations to read, comment and get involved in the conversation that is currently taking place in the blogosphere about associations.  We had many suggestions, including the creation of a central bog that would have RSS feeds from all the blogs with association relevant information.

Our second topic dealt with blogs specific to an association - tips for increasing the level of conversation (comments, more readers, etc).  The blogs discussed here were not about generic nonprofits, these were more specific to a particular organization. 

Ben did a great job in keeping the conversation flowing in an organized manner.  I found the input provided by the attendees very useful... in fact, I've I've already implemented this one:

When you receive a really good comment (or comments) on a particular post, it's a good idea to take the comment and make a new blog-post from it (giving proper credit to the person making the comment) and respond to the comment on this new post.

Ben, thank you for inviting me to BloggerCon - I really enjoyed it and learned a bunch!

Response to a comment on "How a Paradigm is Formed"

A few weeks ago I wrote a blog-post called "How a Paradigm is Formed" and I received the following comment

(Thank you for the comment Moo):

I think you need to be less pessimistic about the world.

If those scientists were still there, poised and ready to spray the 5 new monkeys, then those monkeys were actually correct in living by their learned paradigm. Yes, they didn't know why. But one monkey will eventually just try it and the other monkeys will suffer the consequence - getting wet. Then they'd all know why, and remember that sometimes, just because you don't know the reason for doing something, it doesn't mean there isn't a very good one.

On the other hand, let's take a situation where the scientists are no longer there, yet the monkeys still beat each other up for climbing up the ladder.

One day, one monkey will just go for it and reach the bananas before getting beaten up. And the monkeys will learn. Or maybe not, they're monkeys.

We are human however. We are creative creatures. We learn. We try. We seek out improvements. If we reached the bananas, and saw the benefits of climbing the ladder, we'll try to find a legitamate reason as to why we were beating each other up for climbing the ladder.

And in that way, we learn.

In our world, some things change, and some things don't.

Therefore, it's good to keep an eye out, but living by learned paradigms isn't bad, as long as you remain inquisitive.

Take this century for example. In western society, many of the "old ways" have been dropped.

Yet we have a ridiculous amount of.. depression, broken families, broken hearts ... societal suffering shall we say. Did we really need HIV/AIDS to spread as much as it did? Didn't we already have rules about not having sex with whoever/whenever?

Hope you get my point.

Posted by: moo | August 09, 2007 at 11:53 AM

I was so happy to receive such a generous comment.  This was the reason I starting blogging in the first place: to get a real conversation going!  Again, thank you for your comment Moo. 

And now to respond to it:

Short version... I AGREE with you!

It's funny that you say I need to be "less pessimistic about the world" because I am an extreme optimist!  Actually, I'm an absolutist - that's what I call it.  I am completely aware of the difficult and sometimes horrible situatons happening in the world... but I have absolutely no doubt that everything is going in the right direction.  I am a huge believer of the changes currently happening in the world that will make it better NOW.

I totally agree with your assessment of how humans act.  This example was just an example of how a word that usally has positive connotation (like Paradigm) and it could be negative. 

I also believe that even though the story described in the blog-post is negative, it eventually leads to positive.  The dark ages lead to the renaissance, world wars have lead to peace.  So I am very happy with the current direction of the world. 

The internet is helping to put a strong light on all the negative and injustices going on around the world... and THAT can't be bad, right?  It will push us into taking action against these.

Bloggers in Venezuela

I was pleasantly surprised this past week as I was twittering, to find a well organized blogging community in Venezuela.  I'm surprised by it because of the results shown in the last few elections.  My expectation was that the bloggers had either been quieted by the government or never really existed.  I don't really have any other reason for my surprise, maybe that just shows my ignorance of social behavior.

Having such a large and well-organized blogger community in countries (such as Venezuela) where human rights and injustice is an every-day thing is extremely important.  Giving individuals a voice creates a strong (much louder) voice in unison against an unjust system and eventually helps to turn the tide in the favor of a more just society.  It takes time, but it has to start one letter, one word, one voice at a time.

Here are the bloggers I've met so far.  Most of them are either in Venezuela or from Venezuela... but there are some from Chile, Spain, Colombia and Mexico.  Their themes range from political to sensual to humorous and everything in between.  Most of them are in Spanish (with some English mixed in sometimes).  If you read Spanish, I hope you enjoy these:

1.  Adrian Cachinero Vasiljevic in Madrid, Spain: http://gozkino.com/ (English)

2.  Adriana in Caracas, Venezuela: http://www.cosascotidianas.com/

3.  Adriana Gutierrez in Barquisimeto, Venezuela: http://adrigutierrez.blogspot.com/

4.  Aimee in Caracas: http://bellaaimee.blogspot.com/

5.  Alams Padron in Caracas: http://www.fotoparada.com/

6.  Anabelle in Bogota, Colombia: http://www.huellaspyp.com/

7.  Belkis Araque in Barquisimeto: http://belkisaraque.blogspot.com/

8.  Bombom in Caracas: http://www.bombom.com.ve/blog/

9.  Calendula in Puerto Ordaz, Venezuela: http://calendula.loquesea.org/

10. Cecilia in Madrid: http://laceci.blogspot.com/

11. Depeco in Caracas: http://depeco.blogspot.com/

12. Divina Cereza in Caracas: http://www.impulsosysentidos.com/

13. Edelweiss in Barquisimeto: http://edelweissvoice.wordpress.com/

14. La Mariposa Hily in Barquisimeto: http://mariposahippie.blogspot.com/

15. Francys Geisse Leon, a Venezuelan (Barquisimeto) in Florida:  http://francyskadas.wordpress.com/

16. Geraldine Macias in Mexico City: http://sombrasydebrayes.blogspot.com/

17. Cleo in Maracay, Venezuela: http://cleo285.blogspot.com/

18. Hugo Londoño in Caracas: http://www.qtpd.com/blog/

19. Ira1 in Caracas: http://unpocotocon.blogspot.com/

20. Karelia in Barquisimeto: http://explikme.com/

21. Khabiria in Caracas: http://www.gorditalinda.com/

22. Florecita Yucateca in Mexico City: http://www.florecitayucateca.com/

23. Mariana in Argentina: http://serenatadiurna.blogspot.com/

24. Marole (from Maracay) but lives in Florida: http://marole.blogspot.com/

25. Miguel Angel in Villahermosa, Mexico: http://webmaac.blogspot.com/

26. Minelia "La Tati" Manrique (from Maracay) lives in Miami: http://www.latati.com/blog/

27. Nairoby Prato from Barquisimeto: http://maenairo.blogspot.com/

28. Naky Soto in Caracas: http://www.zaperoqueando.blogspot.com/

29. Nany Leon in Caracas: http://www.nanynany.com/blog/

30. Rosa Jimenez Cano in Madrid: http://www.ociocritico.com/oc/wp/

31. Wari in Caracas: http://sinrazonaparente.blogspot.com/

32. Yiyo in Caracas: http://www.deafindieelephants.com/ (English and Spanish)

This list includes only the ones in my Twitter account.  If you visit their Web sites, you will see blogrolls that include many others.  A lot of these bloggers also have Flickr accounts, they plan meet-ups and are involved in their communities. 

Two things that jumped out at me when I created this list:

1. 28 out of the 32 bloggers are women
2. 7 out of the 32 bloggers are from (or live in) Barquisimeto, Venezuela.  Barquisimeto has less than half the population of Caracas.

Both of these revelations may just be a product of the blogger community which I've encountered, but I found them interesting just the same.

If you know of other Venezuelan or Spanish-Speaking bloggers, please post a comment with their info and I will add them to the list.

Si conoces algun bloggero Venezolano o de habla hispana que debe ser incluida(o) en este listado, enviame su informacion en los comentarios abajo y lo(s) agrego a al listado. Gracias.