Relative Something

There are two primary places where I exist online. Obviously, one of them is this WordPress blog, which I started in 2009. The other is a virtual community called “Brainstorms Metanetwork” that I joined in 2001. Sometimes I lose track of what I’ve written on one or the other, since there is a large overlap in the stories and topics I’ve shared.

A recent thread on what we usually refer to as BSMN has jumped back to some things I wrote 24 years ago about my experience as a boy on the farm called “Intervale Ranch.” If you notice a similarity to Wintervale Ranch, it was intentional, an idea Cyndie came up with, and which means the world to me.

There is a tangled thread of my life intricately woven through that virtual community. I originally learned about it because I fell for online conversation in a way similar, I think, to how people became enamored with Facebook. The Caucus software that I was introduced to by Twin Cities Freenet made sense to me, and I was quickly hooked on conversing with folks via typing my words. I liked it so much that I became saddened that TCFN seemed to be languishing.

One of the brilliant people there suggested I check out Brainstorms if I wanted to see the Caucus software being used by a vibrant community. On Brainstorms, I met Ian Rowcliffe, which led to Cyndie and me traveling to Portugal to experience his world and help him out with projects there. Those life-changing weeks became the seed that germinated into us buying horse property in Wisconsin.

As the online world has evolved since the days when virtual communities were the new and shiny attractions, new energy has dwindled from BSMN. Those of us who stayed around to keep conversing have aged 25-30 years, and we haven’t figured out if anyone in younger generations would be interested in the pen-pal world of typing entire discussions with fellow humans spread out across the globe.

Lately, it seems as though the proliferation of bots and algorithms driving ads, clickbait, and rage in most social media might be causing a decline in interest in those versions of connecting in the online world. Some folks are wondering if that could lead to a return to interest in online communities like ours.

One aspect that I think deserves mention is that an interest in writing is less than half of what leads to a successful experience in a virtual community. An interest in reading other people’s typed-out ideas and opinions is pretty essential. If you’ve read this far in my post today, you are a natural.

Let me know if you ever feel drawn toward participating in a community of readers and writers; show-ers and tellers; listeners and learners; creatives; thinkers; lovers and laughers. A cocktail party with no beginning and no end. A library of stories that is expanding daily.

I’d be happy to guide you along on what could be a spectacular adventure of discovery and potential.

.

.