Posts Tagged ‘meta’

Keeping Identities Separate

August 30th, 2009

For a while, I was importing this blog into my facebook account, but I later chose to stop because I was uncomfortable doing so. Was it fear of how others will judge me for my thoughts? Maybe. At least that’s what originally justified the decision. But looking back, my discomfort with the writing here being posted on Facebook is that it doesn’t fit in.

Facebook is purely social. People behave and interact differently on Facebook. Conversations are casual and playful. When people log on to Facebook, they expect to see what they’re friends are doing in life, where they spent their weekend and what they currently like. Information that would be boring to everyone else but friends. This blog contains none of that, nor is it usually playful. It interferes with expectations.

When expectations are challenged, people become surprised. Surprise leads to curiosity because there it’s inconsistency between an expectation and an observation. Whenever someone is surprised about some subject, their view of that subject (in this case, you who surprised them) is called to be rewritten. If you happen to like the how things are, then it’s discomforting to think that it will change.

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cmalabs turns 1 – a reflection

July 28th, 2009

It was this month last year that I decided to start this web blog. A year has passed and it’s time to reflect.

cmalabs symbolizes a change in my online behaviour. It was a move away from personal blogging because I became more self conscious about privacy.

It’s a place for me to discover my true interests by writing about them. A place to experiment with different styles of writing. A public diary, not a personal diary, but a diary of things I’ve thought about or found interesting. A diary addressed to my future self about ureka moments I’ve had, and about how naive those urekas will seem when I read it again in the future.

It was going to be a central place where I store all my interesting projects, none of which I’ve started.

Today, it is a place for me to experiment with writing. I was hoping that the topics I write about would converge, and through that I could discover what my true interests are. I consider something a true interest if you can talk or write on and on about without getting bored. Until today blog.cmalabs.com is still filled with completely unrelated topics. So I’m far from reaching my goal. The origin of the name “mustard and orange peel” reflects that. “Charles’s blog” sounds too boring, but it’s impossible to categorize what was going to write about because the topics will be too random.

This website might be a year old, but it’s only been active for two month. That is its true age. Hopefully after a year of activity, I’ll be just a little closer to my goal.

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