designswarm thoughts

I’m one of those people who, in order to thoroughly enjoy a book, underlines my way through it. I re-read this one in the last month and thought i’d write things down down. They won’t make much sense outside of the context of the book and maybe that’s what’s interesting to a certain extent. I’ve started thinking that privacy and identity is actually very easy to hide once the general context has been lost.

For you, dear readers, these will be bits of sentences which I am sharing, not because I know you’ll understand them, but because I know you won’t ;)

page 30:
“Mais des tas de fois c’est comme ca, et presque tout le temps: on découvre à la fin que la souffrance, toute cette souffrance-là, était inutile, on a souffert comme des betes et c’était inutile, ca n’était ni juste ni injuste, ni bete, ni moche, c’était simplement inutile, et tout ce que tu peux dire à la fin c’est ca: c’était une souffrance inutile”

page 140
“peindre le rien”

page 153
“s’il y avait une solution une femme la découvrirait, ne serait-ce que par une complicité objective entre enigmes”

page 180
“ou tu regardes, ou tu joues”

page 219
“C’était un mélange de force indiscutable et de solitude définitive. Il les mettait à l’abri de toutes les défaites, et de tous les bonheurs. Ainsi ils perdaient, invaincus, toute leur vie.”

page 232
“Car c’est exactement ainsi qu’apparait la position destinale de l’homme: etre face au monde, avec soi-meme dans le dos.”

page 334
“la cruauté c’est la vertu par excellence des médiocres”

page 476
“la belle époque: on mangeait bien et les heures passaient vite”

A bit of a tradition started 3 years ago by a canadian friend. I think it’s as good a way as any to recap.

1.What did you do in 2009 that you’d never done before?
Missed a flight.

2. Did you keep your New Years’ resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
Really didn’t as far as I can remember. I have a lot on next year’s list as a result.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Yes, plenty. More significantly Caroline my best friend in Canada.

4. Did anyone close to you die?
No.

5. What countries did you visit?
France, Italy, Hungary, Belgium, Netherlands.

6. What would you like to have in 2010 that you lacked in 2009?
Perspective

7. What date from 2009 will remain etched upon your memory?
Easter Friday

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Keeping my company going through a recession.

9. What was your biggest failure?
Totally putting the essentials of my life aside to make 8. happen.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Yes

11. What was the best thing you bought?
Japanese school-girl bag.

12. Whose behaviour merited celebration?
Obama for making me not want to puke anymore when i go to the US.

13. Whose behaviour made you appalled and depressed?
Amy Whinehouse

14. Where did most of your money go?
My business.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Working with great people on exciting projects!

16. What song/album will always remind you of 2009?
Mrs Cold by Kings of Convenience

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
Much more tired.

18. What do you wish you’d done more of?
Sports

19. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Travelling

20. How will you be spending Christmas?
Spent it with some friends.

21. Who did you spend the most time on the phone with?
Brock who works with me

22. Did you fall in love in 2009?
No

23. What was your favourite TV programme?
FireFly and Mad Men

24. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?
No

26. What was the best book(s) you read?
Makers by Cory Doctorow
Book of Dave by Will Self

27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Wild Beasts

28. What did you want and get?
To move somewhere with a garden

29. What did you want and not get?
Peace of mind

30. What were your favourite films of this year?
Up

31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I turned 29 and spent it with friends in London

32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
More money

33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2009?
Back to black

34. What kept you sane?
My friends and family and horrible 80s pop classics

35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Toni Servillo & James McAvoy

36. What political issue stirred you the most?
American elections

37. Who did you miss?
Friends across the world, Caroline more than most.

38. Who was the best new person you met?
Ben

39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2009.
You can only really choose one between fame and fortune. They rarely come together.

40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year?

Every shooting stars in one night
The water and sand in our eyesight
The rocks in our hands preparing for flight
The lack of sleeping but it’s alright

If you fancy at all, do link to your own list!

Good conferences are about managing expectations: the speakers’ and the audience’s. They’ve paid to attend, the speaker has probably paid to fly over and add their professional profile to making the event worth going to in the first place. Both parties should be cared for.

At the end of a realllly long year and looking at Dopplr I’ve spoken or organised workshops at 12 different conferences this year and thought I’d come up with a few points about what I know makes me a better speaker. This might not apply to others, but I know it would make a world of difference to me.

1. Don’t ask for the presentation in advance. Chances are you’ll never get it. I’m usually juggling running my business and thinking about your event about 2 days before it starts, writing my talk in the plane/train on the way there and ready about 20 seconds before going live. So don’t bully me or treat me like a child on email with reminders. I’ll delete them.

2. Tell me who is in the room. Out of the 12 conferences only 1 gave me a spreadsheet with details about the attendees. Simple, efficient and got me to tailor my presentation to the crowd. Online communities for the conferences are only good for the attendees themselves, I don’t have the time to engage.

3. Don’t give me one of those awkward neck microphones. I’m a woman with short hair. I care about how my hair will look with your contraption on which is usually shitty.

4. Keep emails short. Just like you would if you were emailing someone you work with. I just want to know where to go and when I’m on.

5. Introduce me to people. I’ve just spoken, everyone knows about me, I don’t know them. Take me around and think about who I would get along with. This is incredibly important and I’ve found that the number of times I’ve been approached after a talk has decreased steadily as people consider adding me to twitter as a way to connect. I’m here, I’m present, this should be an opportunity to make a real connection. Help me out.

6. Pay for my travel and accomodation if you can. If you can’t, give me reasons for my I should go especially if you’re charging attendees a ton of cash. (Back to number 2 really)

7. Don’t do the whole backchannel projected behind me thing. Super distracting because people just can’t listen to you , look at your slides, a live twitter stream and their own laptop without getting totally distracted, laugh at the wrong moments and therefore totally putting me off. danah’s post is more than enough regarding that particular issue.

8. Make my badge readable and don’t make it too long. I don’t want people staring at my navel or crotch to read my already unreadable name. Actually, this applies to all badges for any conference ever made. The only 2 pieces of information you need to show is someone’s name and their company. That’s it. In BIG. No logo, no funky colours, maybe a distinction between a speaker and an attendee but make that easy too. It’s such an important piece of communication but so many conferences get it wrong or over-think it. Here’s a suggestion of what it could look like:

As we move towards an ever increasing professional connectedness and conference fatigue sets in, I think these could really make a difference.