Lisa Padilla on Media and Culture

(Dee Luo) This must be as old a debate as any words invented to use in a debate. Technology versus human culture. Many 3rd world tribes have several feelings against media. The Maasai in Kenya and Tanzania prefer not to have their pictures taken because they think it will take their spirit away. The Armish as don't like it either but this is more directly to do with technology. From About.com: "The Amish are averse to any technology which they feel weakens the family structure. The conveniences that the rest of us take for granted such as electricity, television, automobiles, telephones and tractors are considered to be a temptation that could cause vanity, create inequality, or lead the Amish away from their close-knit community and, as such, are not encouraged or accepted in most orders. Most Amish cultivate their fields with horse-drawn machinery, live in houses without electricity, and get around in horse-drawn buggies. It is common for Amish communitie...

Rafe Needleman is one of my favorite reporters. I wonder instead of being hated, how he manages to stay relatively well-liked. The other ironic thing is that by writing about how much they are hated, those five people must like him even more. Ah, there's the real magic. I interviewed Rafe a while back about his initiative at CNET called Webware. Some insiders at CNET tell me that it doesn't directly make money (sounded a little paranoid actually), but I would tell CNET that Webware is great for it's own brand awareness, plus it raises visibility for all those companies and software applications.

Google is hiring and here's what the ad on their web site said. "Passionate about these topics? You should work at Google. • algorithms • artificial intelligence • compiler optimization • computer architecture • computer graphics • data compression • data mining • file system design • genetic algorithms • information retrieval • machine learning • natural language processing • operating systems • profiling • robotics • text processing • user interface design • web information retrieval • and more!"

Social media was made for me. I have always favored personal bonds among colleagues and more often than not found it to strengthen the work created together. I have accounts at over 30 social networking sites. I Twitter , Pownce , Jaiku , Flickr and Blip . I chat on over half a dozen instant messaging clients. I write 4 blogs and echo each of those in excerpt or comment on many other web sites. I have several feed readers and foster relationships with influencers I respect to keep up with anything I might have missed. My attention touches a lot of things and I like it that way. Some people feel that there is no intellect in the village, especially if the village is filled with idiots, but I disagree. We can learn much from this knowledge, about the variety of individual beliefs and collective views and about problem solving. So I'm a big fan, you can tell. But I want to raise a problem with social networking yet unsolved. What's missing is the ability to socially "(un)boo...

This week on BlogTalkRadio I had the opportunity to interview John Battelle. You can read up on John or read his blog, Searchblog . He offered a good discussion on information availability, social networks and what he calls "conversational media". Here's where you can listen to our talk . John spoke on the show about how interconnected social groups were becoming. So, from a chapter called The Computer and the Counterculture in the book The Cult of Information by Theodore Roszak, I pulled this quote. I believe it describes a fundamental change in individual isolation which is very powerful as most of us imagine: "Both the quantity and content of available information is set by centralized institutions -- the press, TV, radio, news services, think-tanks, government agencies, schools and universities -- which are controlled by the same interests which control the rest of the economy. By keeping information flowing from the top down, they keep us isolated from each ...

Join me tomorrow at 10 am PST (or download the podcast later) for Evern Williams and Dr. Lynette Cruz, broadcasting with me live on Lisacast.com . Williams is the community media manager at Olelo television in Honolulu, HI and Dr. Cruz is a cultural anthropology professor and public access activist. I have my own ties to this part of the world having lived for a time on Oahu . I first learned about co-located server infrastructures on the first ISP on the islands. The gentleman I worked for, an engineer, taught me about data storage, security and the business of moving information. This was the foundation for my subsequent interest in media management and publishing. and the changes we've seen for more than a decade surrounding our romance with all things digital. I also held other odd but interesting jobs and had the best meal of my life to date, right there in downtown Honolulu. The name of the restaurant is Chef Mavro , by the way.

Last night I met with one of my favorite people in the industry, humble ex-physicist David Nordfors, now running the Innovation Journalism department at Stanford University. Next week marks his 4th conference on journalism here in the Bay Area. Keynoted first by Doug Engelbart, who I saw many years ago at Parc, and is speaking here about the societal collective intelligence of society, will be moderated by John Markoff. Next, by Curtis Carlson, on the discipline of innovation (insert whip sound here). Mr Carlson is the president of SRI International. Check out the rest of the speakers here , you'll even find some familiar locals. Mr. Nordfors, a best practice communication advocate aiming consistently for a program which will allow us to get more out of the event, is changing the format of this years conference slightly by extending the length of breaks and lunches. This way people can connect, which is the whole idea in the first place. As David left our meeting last night to see ...

Click to view this 4-minute video Roberto Spiezio, citizen journalst from Italy, is interviewed about his entry into the world of journalism. After my interview with Mr. Spiezio in South Korea, we corresponded by email and he was kind enough to offer more information about politics and media in his home country of Italy. LP: Thank you in advance for your perspectives on life in Italy, Roberto. First, let me ask, how does Italy view immigration? RS: This is a really sensitive issue and one of the usual battlefields for the political parties. The left wing has a policy of aperture about immigration, because of ideological matters and because immigrants are a good source of political consensus. At the moment the government (left wing) has given many immigrants a resident status, as long as they have a regular job. In the past few years the right wing government had cracked down on immigration, by making the entrance and the staying in Italy a lot more difficult. As example, a...

This week I attend the largest technology conference I have seen to date. Typically held in Geneva, the International Telecommunication Union Conference (ITU) was held in Hong Kong December 2006. Held once every 4 years, this event has drawn over 150,000 attendees from all over the world. Those who know me will understand the sheer nirvana I am experiencing in connecting with people from so many countries all discussing and understand opportunities to extend technology and improve social conditions. Very few people I spoke with in the US before the event even knew what the ITU was, including me, so I learned that the ITU is the telecommunications committee for the United Nations (UN). This morning, among a diverse and experienced group of telecommunication leaders in a panel on this first official day of the event, were Andre Smit of Cisco and Didier Philippe , President of the Micro-Enterprise Acceleration Institute in Switzerland, who is working with HP. They spoke about the conver...

On Saturday night this week I witnessed something interesting. It was the Live Billboard Project in San Francisco. It wasn't interesting because it was effective. It seemed to sell nothing more than the concept alone. What was interesting was that it arrested the attention of hundreds of people on Mission Street. When I came upon them, they were standing completely silent, staring up at the building. I wondered at first if there were a band performing on the roof, but I found that not to be the case. I'm all for performace art (not really) and for experimental advertising (if it sells). Calvin Klein did a live billboard about a year ago, and models danced around above their store in the clothes. That probably sold a few more clothes. But on Mission Street, the cafe scene meets gymnast act meets lack of purpose, seemed to mesmerize a group of people, again, to complete silence. The only sound beside the cars passing by was a man on the opposite corner telling everyone that the ...

I write to you frustrated and discouraged in hopes that you might shed light on a 'cold prickly' feeling I have. We could agree for the sake of my inquiry, that just as many people in the information movement, I struggle with the selection of who to read, who to agree with and my own voice in the blogosphere as it rises to capture it's own A-Listesque audience. To make a difference. A positive one. Frequently identified by others as a having a positive, energetic, and nearly Polyanna-like position, I am concerned to find myself presently disenchanted with our collective efforts to expose and analyze media's growth and expansion and its effect on our societies. Is it the liquid bombing threat this week in London? Dave Winer taking little Liz Henry to task about sexism? The howels of pain from inside AOL? The inspiring conversations I have with people at conferences that fade into oblivious memory weeks later? I've approached several industry pundits and challenged th...

I am finally reading JD Lasica's Darknet, an educated vigilante conversation accessible to understanding even to those who aren't in the space. And for those who are, it's a nice chewy account of what's been and what can be in the underground Internet. JD's approach is like no one I know; he's a little off and it gets your attention. Lisa likes the slightly offbeat. I first learned of Lasica while working with Marc Canter (founder of Broadband Mechanics; who can't love this guy to whom we owe thanks for Ms. Pacman, Macromedia Director and an anti-orthodox project process which has often looked chaotic but nearly as often produced brilliant work). Read Darknet and send me comments about the Internet underground, the communal digital pockets you like. More colonization.

For all colonies who are dependent on gasoline. Updated every evening. Find the lowest gas near you by zipcode. http://autos.msn.com/everyday/gasstations.aspx?zip=&src=Netx