By the Letter E

Many of us look for ways to be more efficient users of our planet and the stuff on it. We try to recycle, up cycle, bicycle, and every other cycle out there to ensure that we aren't just using up her resources.  That's why when apps like Yerdle come up and offer us a new way of reusing our old items people are quick to jump into it and use it to do just that.  Yerdle was everything that we had never seen before.  It was a unique auction like system that allowed people to post items that they had lying around in closets and the garage and get "CREDIT POINTS" for them.  Then you were allowed to use your credit points to bid on auctions for other people's items.  The highest bidder wins and then pays a small fee for shipping. The poster prints the label that Yerdle sends you via email, then takes the package to their local UPS store for delivery.  That easy.  Well, that was then, and in just a few short months Yerdle has made it very clear that they have other

Let me begin by stating that I have not had such difficulty assimilating the contents of an article in quite some time. I am referencing the WIRED article written in 2012 by Bruce Sterling titled An Essay on the New Aesthetic.  As I read, I found it difficult to keep up with all of the various and turbulent metaphors in the reading.  It was like watching a bouncing super ball in a concrete room. Did you see what I did there? I began to wonder if in fact Bruce Sterling really knew what he was trying to talk about in his descriptions of the New Aesthetic.  I managed to gather a few key points from his essay that make an attempt at defining the New Aesthetic. The article is older, but the ideas presented are timeless. The New Aesthetic is according to Sterling; A creative movement A Collective Internet based Built by and for working creatives All very true points, I like to take this one step further and say that not only is it these descriptive terms but the New Aesthet

By the Letter E: Ello.co : A welcome change to the social media lan... : So there's this new social media thing. The "anti-facebook" out there in the virtual space. It is calling to all to join and n...

So there's this new social media thing. The "anti-facebook" out there in the virtual space. It is calling to all to join and not letting anyone join at the same time.  The elite, those with the coveted golden ticket can enter and partake on the newest social media site.  The Ello.co site is invite only while it is in beta testing.  I was fortunate enough to be able to access through someone in one of my Google+ circles (see Google+ is good for something :)).  I had a slight bit of difficulty entering the site because I was granted an invite, but just one I had to type in myself not the actual formal email invite.  So because I was trying to login using the regular ello.co site, and not the ello.co/join site, I had some issues BUT eventually we figured it all out and I was in. I soon discovered that I did not have the 25 invites that were once available.  This may have been because their server was down for a bit.  Virtually hundreds and hundreds of people were joining eve

It has taken me quite some time to think about what if anything I wanted to express in my blog about the loss of actor Robin Williams. People die every second of every day, and I hardly bat an eye. I don't know them nor have I ever known their life stories. They are just people. Their lives are special to the ones that loved them. I hardly bat a eye as I know that there is nothing that I could have possibly done to save them. Death is a part of life. Wait, let me rephrase that, natural death is a part of life. Suicide on the other hand is not. It is something that I cannot comprehend. I don't understand the dark place in someone's mind and heart that suicide resides in. It is selfish. It is brutal, raw, and so unforgiving to those left behind. Suicide is not fair play. I think that is why I had such a hard time trying to wrap my head around the death of Robin Williams. The SUICIDE OF ROBIN WILLIAMS! Words left me after I heard the news, I was literally speechless and felt

So, the other day I was reading through my usual social media outlets and catching up on the news.  I stumbled upon a post by Arianna Huffington where she was asking people what their " Wake Up Call " moments in their lives were.  She solicited stories from people and in exchange would select a few to receive a copy of her new book THRIVE: The Third Metric To Redefining Success And Creating A Life of Well Being, Wisdom, and Wonder.   I submitted my wake up call, not thinking anything would come of it but scared to death because what I told her in my story I had never told more than a few people about.  As soon as I finished my article and hit the send button on that email I knew only two things.  1. That I had just told the potential world that I and my family were homeless a couple of years ago, and 2. That admission was scary as hell.  There are many in the world that are quick to pass judgement on others and I had spent the last 2 years reading all of the negative thing