RIP Christopher Hitchens

Christopher-hitchens

" The only position that leaves me with no cognitive dissonance is atheism. It is not a creed. Death is certain, replacing both the siren-song of Paradise and the dread of Hell. Life on this earth, with all its mystery and beauty and pain, is then to be lived far more intensely: we stumble and get up, we are sad, confident, insecure, feel loneliness and joy and love. There is nothing more; but I want nothing more."

– Christopher HItchens in The Portable Atheist: Essential Readings for the Non-Believer, 2007

You can find a fitting and rollicking eulogy over at the New Yorker.

Update

Actually I've just come across another quote which seems to sum up his spirit as well as anything. A mixture of inspiring, defiant devotion to individual expresssionism and the utmost contempt for correct society:

"My own opinion is enough for me. And I claim the right to have it defended against any consensus, any majority, anywhere, any place, anytime. And anyone who disagrees with this can pick a number, get in line and kiss my ass."

Somewhere :: the new direction for my start-up

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Somewhere helps talent and companies find cultural fits.

We believe that traditional recruitment processes and tools like CVs and job descriptions are outdated, generic and often ineffective.

In our creative, knowledge-led economy, the biggest determinant of successful work is not neceesarily skills or experience, it's finding the right environment, ethos, people and atmosphere. In short, culture. 

Somewhere wants to create work joy by enabling talent and companies an entirely new way to discover, screen and meet one another.

Talent can pre-register at www.SomewhereHQ.com.

Companies interested in finding talent that fits their cuture can pre-register at beta.SomewhereHQ.com

To find out more about what we're doing visit blog.SomewhereHQ.com.

And follow along on Twitter @SomewhereHQ.

Introducing @Cowbird. More story-telling magic from Jonathan Harris aka @jjhnumber27 (this time participatory!)

Cowbird

The brand new story telling platform Cowbird has just launched publicly. It's been made by the ever-amazing Jonathan Harris who's been a personal inspiration of mine for many years.

Here's how he's introduced it:

Hey there, you beautiful birds.

After 2+ years of work, 145,000+ lines of code, one Icelandic grass hut, one night in jail, one serving of jellied ram's testicles with fermented shark meat, and countless pieces of toast with orange marmalade, it is my great pleasure to introduce you to Cowbird, a labor of love, and hopefully something that will have a long and meaningful life.

Cowbird is a community of storytellers, focused on deeper, longer-lasting, more personal storytelling than you're likely to find anywhere else on the Web.

Cowbird allows you to keep a beautiful audio-visual diary of your life (here's mine), and to collaborate with others in documenting the overarching "sagas" that shape our world today (starting with the Occupy Wall Street movement).

Our short-term goal is to pioneer a new form of participatory journalism, grounded in the simple human stories behind major news events. Our long-term goal is to build a public library of human experience -- kind of like a Wikipedia for real life (but much more beautiful).

Here is an overview of the project:

Here are some good Cowbird stories:

Here is the story of me getting arrested a few weeks ago at Occupy Oakland :)

Our community is still very small. We are looking for excellent storytellers -- photographers, writers, filmmakers, journalists, etc. If you would like to become a Cowbird storyteller, please request an invitation (we're trying to grow slowly).

If you know other folks who would be a natural fit for Cowbird, please send them our way.

Please spread the word about this project. Tweet it. Facebook it. Tumble it. Email it. Talk about it. Shout it from the rooftops, where those silly pigeons are roosting and pooping. Tell those dirty birds to move over, and make a little room for a different kind of bird.

Beautiful things lie ahead.

Jonathan

I played around with the platform a few weeks back. I can see how this could be very powerful in the right, committed story-telling hands. I posted a story of mine from many years ago.