Burning Bucks in Beantown

I’m in Cambridge for a gathering called Beyond Broadcast. I doubt I’ll be blogging it much, but I’ll probably twitter a bit. My twitter page is here. Last year I tried to get here via Second Life and I ran into a few technical difficulties.

I got into into Boston yesterday and started burning money on cab rides and meals at the Kendall Square Legal Seafood… lobstah roll for lunch and fried clams for dinner. Last night in my room I ordered a dessert and a decaf espresso. I don’t know if it was the clams, the ganache or the fact that I ran into DW at the Copley Marriott a few hours earlier, but I found myself humbled and worshipping at the porcelain god that I call Ralph. The discomfort passed away as quickly as it arrived and I had a good night’s sleep, untroubled by bossy kitties or face licking dogs.

Despite that dyspeptic moment with Winer, who felt a need to confront me for expressing my own opinions, I enjoyed the IMA Public Media 2024 closing speeches by Tim Karr and Doc Searls. I’ve heard Doc’s current schtick in a variety of venues over the last year or so.. I think he packaged the cognitive linguistics piece for last year’s Freedom to Connect (F2C) conference in Silver Spring. But if I’m fortunate enough to be exposed to Doc’s developing thought so some of it seems less than fresh and spontaneous, still I always go away feeling better informed. He’s a trouper and an original thinker, a real presence on stage who can turn complex ideas into pop cultural memes at the turn of a phrase. Here’s a picture of Doc with Larry Josephson, one of his early and continuing influences…