Through A Glass Darkly

"For Now We See In A Mirror Dimly...

but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I shall know fully just as I also have been fully known."
(I Corinthians 13:12)


Understanding this piece of Scripture, whether you're a pure Christian Believer or choose to acknowledge basic premise truths in life, is a powerful understanding. We have an obscured view of life and selves and regardless of personally held belief systems, being aware that we do allows a better perspective on how things are and the control we do and don't have over circumstances. How also we can make the best of them and not allow kismet to overcome us.

"On Reflection" by JR Snyder Jr 2010

For me the Personal Key in Life is intrinsic in me and my belief is it's rooted in my Christian background and the fundamental basic truths originally intended in the New and Old Testaments. They provided the foundation for the broader understanding of how to interpret and cope with the world. I am not so arrogant and audacious to believe that access to understanding, enlightenment and spiritual awareness is limited to one religion or spiritual path. This has given me much trouble over the decades with fellow Christian Believers...so be it.

My Key is about rising above, looking up and thinking positively and faith in a Higher Power. We can always look around and find someone better off and someone worse off than we are. We are bound to feel downhearted at times, it is how we turn it around that matters. It takes work.

Our vision is veiled but we see enough outline to tell what is good and right and where and how to proceed. On occasion we get rare visions of beautiful clarity, however mostly it's operating on instinct. Experience is the greatest teacher and to not learn from it is folly. Once you go near the fire, you don't go back to get burned again. Negativity spirals down a dark pit. Thinking positive and heading to light attracts others looking for light, not darkness...support always helps. To that end, take from Jesus, "Let your light shine before men in such a way they may see..." (Matthew 5:16).

If you're secular and believe nothing spiritual, I won't argue with you over that, it's your choice and everyman has free will. On the other hand I won't argue with you if you draw your Higher Power from a supernatural being or a belief that is different from mine, my only judgment is I must perceive that it comes from light.
__________________________________________________________________________________

Sunset Point Scenic View

Black Canyon Highway (I-17) Exit 252 Sunset Point Scenic View 

 

Sunset Point is a popular overlook from the rest area on the Black Canyon Highway (Interstate 17) located at exit 252 just north of Bumble Bee and south of Badger Springs Road. It sits on a mesa ("tabletop mountain") and the rest area is on the western edge of the mesa. You can stand with your back less than one-half mile from interstate traffic and overlook a beautiful vista known for it's scenic sunsets, hence the name. A traveler passing through Arizona, unable to take the time to visit the beautiful geography of the state, for a few moments at least, can intake some of the state's charm. If they arrive at the right time, they can see a beautiful sunset fall below the mountains into Bumble Bee and Crown King.

Enjoy a short video of the mesa on the east side of the Black Canyon Highway and the vista from the overlook on the west side of the Interstate.

__________________________________________________________________

Arizona Sunset Point Scenic View on the Black Canyon Highway from JR Snyder Jr on Vimeo.

__________________________________________________________________

Buzz Is Not A Whisperer

Google Buzz is calling...an opportunity to make a call?

I'm still missing some pieces from the Google Buzz puzzle and I haven't got that much time to devote to it right now, possibly that's one flaw inherent in it's launch. Buzz wasn't exactly welcome in my life but I kept an open mind and clear head and now have a few plugged in thoughts about it.

In a Buzz post, I think Sheryl Breuker (The Gabby Geek) of Stardust Global Ventures, brought up an important point regarding following and that this launch could be an opportunity from the outset. A window in which we can choose who to follow, be followed by and finding new people. In my mind we have the option to make a judgment call, a chance to decide if we want our scope to be narrow or wide and for professional or personal use or both. This new connection could also be a good platform to scale up or down our online social networking if we choose.

To that end I can also see how this could end up appealing more to the business, enterprise and eventually the public sectors and subsequently more appropriate for professional and business use. It may compete just as much with LinkedIn as Facebook and Twitter. If that is the case, as an individual, it might be better to start out slowly and not poison the well. Many people have started using social web sites without thinking of the consequences and paid a price when potential clients, employers and recruiters started using these sites as research tools. The lack of real knowledge about what has happened with our personal privacy is startling to witness when something new like Buzz comes along.

It's my opinion some of the noise about privacy comes from the usual suspects. They tend to be the same people who belch junk and then wonder why they get trolled and/or hacked. Don't do stupid stuff anywhere, online or off, act responsibly and you stand a good chance of remaining intact. On the other hand, that calls for Google and other keepers of our data, to continually improve the protection of our information and privacy by giving us easy access to controls. Users shouldn't have to search and try to figure Buzz out, it must be more intuitive if they want people of this decade to feel comfortable using it. I'm practiced at figuring these things out and that factor of difficulty has made even me a bit cautious, since I don't have the time to fiddle with it right now. Like everyone else, Buzz was thrust upon me with an existing Gmail account and consequently required some immediate attention to decide what to do about it, if only to figure out how to turn it off should I want to. My personal choice was to devote a little time to it and see what the implications are.

I can't help but wonder what the person thinks who has a Gmail account because they were forced into one by YouTube, someone who is skilled at only (and only cares to be) using Gmail as email or a Blogger user that doesn't really use Gmail, about getting Buzz. Whether it was taken into consideration by Google is a toss of the coin, they either took it as a calculated risk or most likely, didn't think of it at all.

It is a good concept, I admit to being surprised at liking it as much on first impression as I do. I hope it gets better and gets a good response from a responsible audience but it needs interface improvement for privacy and controls as well as interaction. It's an opportunity to review what we want or don't want with our personal online social life and make a choice about making connections or not. I think it will gain traction because it's already caused me to re-discover and find out new things about Gmail...that in itself is a "win" for Google and probably worth their risk, intended or otherwise.

Top left photo: Albuquerque (NM) Toll and Assistance Switchboard Tandem Circuits

Bottom right photo: Sunset Point (Arizona) Communications Towers

JR Snyder Jr copyright 2010

 

Online Social Networking: 2010

What I think now...

Two years ago I did a video blog "Online Social Networking Revolution: Thinking Ahead." It was one of my first video blogs and although I cringe at my presentation and editing, it remains a video that continues to get views.

This is my follow up video blog with some of my current thoughts on online social networking. Over the 15 years that I've been interacting online, YouTube and vlogging really changed the game for me four years ago when I first ventured there. The interaction on YouTube, the video sharing site, made it also a social web site. It pushed many of us further online because it allowed the presentation of self in real life (apologies to Erving Goffman)...we could see each other in video and get a better sense of the people we interacted with online.

Much has been made about what happened with online social networking, interaction and the community on YouTube, however there is no doubt that the site advanced online interaction into the mainstream. It remains to be seen what happens with YouTube but my belief has been that Google as a corporation had (and still has) no idea what it had in YouTube in the aspect of online social networking and what direction to go with it. It has never been in the MBA/CPA marketing business school mindset principles the company operates by, no matter how cool their campus was too work at and trendy their logo was. It was only a matter of time before the community on YouTube became a temporary moment in an era now gone by.

In any case what I've learned personally about online social networking is that it intersects in my life and is integrated now with offline "real life" social networking. A large number of the people I've met online since the early nineties I have met in person and maintain contact with. Those that I haven't, the virtual relationships have become as real as those with people I know in person. I no longer distinguish the difference.

One thing has become clear, everyone must now come to terms with how to handle life online and offline, even if for some that means opting out and not engaging online at all. That is still a choice that must be reckoned with, since to engage or not through the internet, means a decision has been made about relationships. It is neither right or wrong and everyone must decide individually what is best for them in their own personal happiness and choose how they want to interact with other people.

_________________________________________________________________

Online Social Networking 2010 (What I Think Now) from JR Snyder Jr on Vimeo.

_________________________________________________________________

January 14, 2008

_____________________________________________________________

Urban Desert Storm: Phoenix Arizona September 2009

I'm a geek...weather interests me

Urban Desert Storm Summer 2009 from JR Snyder Jr on Vimeo.

Video Response to my unedited video "Urban Desert Rain 09/16/2007"

http://www.youtube.com/jrsnyderjr

Early Morning Rain Clouds

it rarely rains in central Phoenix...


05:30 nice gentle rain falling now!

Phoenx South Mountain Communications Towers

Twenty Towers Top South Mountain



Over the years I've wondered about the vulnerability of the towers on South Mountain. Usually decades ago when lightning protection was not what it is today, the concern was lightning strikes. That also sparks another concern, wildfires from the brush that covers the mountain, which could be started by lightning.
After September 11, 2001 the security of locations like this all over the US was reconsidered. The Bush Administration quietly spent millions of dollars in securing all kinds of locations. Among other things 911 emergency communication systems were upgraded both in locations like this and correspondingly in 911 centers.

This video blog was taken on South Mountain where the communications towers are located.
.....................................................................................................
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8obFpg_MTYk

http://www.youtube.com/jrsnyderjr

The Economy and Me: My Hometown

Phoenix, Arizona | Labor Day Weekend

This is the summer I believe we will look back and remember as the time when the fullness of this economic crisis and the aftermath, became much more real to the mass population.

Relatively no one will go untouched by the current and upcoming extended economic period. The United States and world are affected profoundly and in this video blog I discuss my thoughts on the one city and state, Phoenix, Arizona that I know well. In my mind the most difficult bear to wrestle is going to be unemployment because that is about income. The conundrum is an old one and too large to tackle here.
.......................................................

Due to my personal circumstances I've had unique opportunities to see this economic crisis develop to it's ultimate collapse in a variety of ways. My professional associates, friends, family and myself have had to and are dealing with issues daily very directly and no end seems in sight. Currently I am in a good place of acceptance with an understanding of basic facts that no public relations spin of any corporation, media outlet or government agency will change my mind about, when they're as plain as the nose on my face. Of course my acceptance is subject to change with new information, since the ground is shifting beneath us. Another key though is knowing that shifting ground is part of the package.

It's been a long road since this Economic Crisis really began for me with the Tech/Telecom Crash in 2000 and then exacerbated by the events of September 11, 2001. Additionally I am living in a state that was giddy with vaporous money at the height of the market, when my mindset was that if it seemed too good to be true, it was. There have been employment and monetary struggles but they have been overcome, but not without challenges.

As painful as it's been at times, this decade for me has been rich with learning new things about myself and others, as well as where, when and how my values diverged with certain parts of American culture (such as consumerism). So many of us were sidetracked and I'm finding many of us are now finding our way back to our original selves and reflecting on "where do we go from here"?

This is a topic I am far from done writing and video blogging about I suspect.
.......................................................

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FbCARgTdin8

.......................................................

There is a lake in California...

A visit to Dry Ford Lake in California in August, peak heat of the year



My video blog on YouTube



http://www.youtube.com/jrsnyderjr

_____________________________________________________________________________________

...on not casting pearls before swine

If you live long enough you experience the joy of learning things over and over again.

This is certainly true for me regarding the internet and specifically the social web. In the nineties when the internet came into the mainstream and more social with the advent of the worldwide web, I learned some lessons which laid the foundation for how I intended to deal with a technology that quickly became an information backbone of our time.

Since then, the internet has become more ubiquitous. A wealth of information and a cyber junkyard, a web of commerce and a social networking venue but above all else an overflowing warehouse of too much data. The rules controlling my online social engagement are pretty much the same as they are offline. I have come to relearn that not only is it intrinsic to my nature to be selective but also a requirement in order to keep my sense of self relatively intact as well as balance and order in my life. Rules for my life online need to come from my experience in life offline.


I was the kid who lived in a remote place and back in the day would have loved to have online interaction to explore the world and for a while escape what seemed like a mundane local world.


Oh, if I only knew then what I know now...

For some reason it seems necessary to reconsider the ground rules for operating on the internet. I'm not sure why...but I trust my instincts. It's not clear if this is due to the economic crisis, a change of decade, feeling overwhelmed, I'm wiser or something else and right now the reason seems irrelevant. The bottom line fundamental rule is I have control over how much and what information I see, and who I interact with online and any benefit or repercussions are due to my choices. In any case I use and interact on the web on my terms and what I use any website for is generally my business and not subject to the opinion of people who do not influence me.

This doesn't mean that I'm stopping or slowing my current online activity or judging what anyone else does. Perhaps our privacy is not as intact as we'd like to think and we should recognize accessing the "information superhighway" means sharing the road with unlicensed drivers. That also means making intelligent choices about how much road we can handle and proceed with caution.

____________________________________________________________________

http://www.youtube.com/jrsnyderjr