Currently reading: This Is Your Brain On Music // Currently hearing: Freelance Whales

I have no idea how to start this post so I’m just going to jump into it – blame the lack of doing any free writing at all lately.

I’m becoming more and more aware that I end up censoring things I want to write or comment on. That’s incredibly disappointing when it seems like I have more to say than ever. This isn’t solely related to this blog – it’s across all of my social networks too.

I know it’s entirely out of a desire of being able to get my thoughts out anonymously without thinking about what my friends think. That’s fucking pathetic but unfortunately true. I tend to tell myself that I don’t really care what other people think. I’m pretty firm in my ideologies but I know for a fact that I would write less inhibited if people didn’t associate who’s writing these words with who I am when we’re hanging out.

It’s a conflicting issue — on one hand you’d probably get a better idea of who I am and how I think by reading a few posts around here but it’s come to a point where I don’t feel like sharing because unfortunately this text can only convey a message or feeling to such an extent.

I’m also not sure that I like the link to the past that these posts have created. I am not ashamed of past-tense me but I’m not entirely that person anymore either and the only way I feel able to show that is to cut ties in ways that don’t make any sense at all.

I guess most of all I feel jaded. Not sad, but disappointed in realizing that so much that I’ve cared about politically, musically, and socially really only ever mattered to me. I’m not winning anyone over. Lately I’m not even engaging in any interesting discussion.

This may all have to do with transparency and ease of sharing online anymore. I’ve gone from wanting throw out every little emotional twinge to the wind via this blog to wanting to compartmentalize what, how, and with who I share information.

I guess I’m stoked to now just push a photo or video to my friends and family on a smaller scale via Facebook rather than write a page about why I love a new album from such-and-such band.

Postblink has been really cool. I opened up a dialog with people. Nothing will ever be as straight-up random to me as when I was at Warped Tour in Minnesota a few years ago and a couple of bloggers who read my rants recognized me. I started this blogging thing as an experimentation to teach myself a little bit about web development and greater goals spawned forth. I don’t know if I’ll ever reach 10% of what came to mind but it’s been fun nonetheless.

I’m still brainstorming what I want to do here. I’ve got no intentions of closing up shop, so to speak, but it’s obviously been on hold for a bit. I guess this post doesn’t make a lot of sense. It’s kind of a “I’m still here but I have no idea why” sentiment. That’s just kind of where I am with life right now. Damn that sounds significantly more depressing than I mean it to – see what I mean with text only taking me so far? Fuck it. Until next time!

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Bandwagon, etc.

Some new stuff is up at ReLife if you want to check it out. Yes, that was a shameless plug and here are three more (the first one is sincere, the latter two are my ironic facebook observations:

Church Under The Bridge

BandWagon

Why I can’t get a girlfriend - I stole the idea for this one from another blogger, but it amused me nonetheless.

Cross-posting FTW.

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I thought we were bros, brah?!

Most of the “applicationson Facebook are completely useless. Some are moderately entertaining time-wasters, like Mafia Wars. The idea behind Mafia Wars and similar games on Facebook is to keep you clicking through their pages which serve ads that they receive their revenue from. Of course the more unique views each ad receives the more cash the content providers make. That’s why you’re encouraged to invite your friends. This is called spam.

It’s also why you’re limited on how many “invites” you can send via Facebook applications. Apparently the developers realized people might flee from their service if they were bombarded with random invites constantly (see “MySpace“). Most people still receive several invites from different friends, but the number is much smaller than if there were no limitations on applications.

I rarely accept app invites. The Facebook dev platform, in my opinion, is not safe enough to entrust my information to at random. I take very few steps to conceal my privacy on the web – most of my social networking profiles are completely open and contain a lot of information short of my social security number or a debit card PIN. If you’re intelligent about how you use the web you can get away with this. If you enjoy clicking random advertisements, entering your home address for the prize you’ve !!!JUST WON!!!, or even your phone information, you can’t get away with this. People that want your information have become very skilled at setting up traps so that less tech savy people do all the work for them. They’re not interested in actively targeting individuals, for the most part. Or maybe I’m just naive, believing I have nothing worthwhile to steal.

Uh.. Anyways, somehow this turned into a rant.

At one point or another I’ve accepted family invites via a Facebook relative application. Also, during last fall’s election I had added Obama’s profile to receive news updates on Facebook. The applications on Facebook often send you messages about a friend who’s recommended something for you or wants to be linked to you in some way. Please note that those messages are bullshit.

Obama has added you as a cousin?!?!

Obama has added you as a cousin. True story?

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