Thinking Blogger Award Goes Here ↓

So, Paul Levinson, who got me started on this blogging thing of ours in the first place, seems pleased with my efforts, and consequently has bestowed upon me the coveted Thinking Blogger Award.

High honors indeed for this humble blog. He made the announcement over at Paul Levinson's Infinite Regress blog, in a post entitled The Thinking Blogger Award and I note with some amusement that he chose to list this blog as Time Passing, whereas others have referred to it as Blog Time Passing, and as Lance Strate's Blog Time Passing. In case you were wondering, I realized that there was some ambiguity about how to punctuate the title of this blog when I came up with it (which was on the fly), and I liked that ambiguity as a matter of fact, so I'm not saying that Paul is wrong or anything, I'm just noting that this is the first time that someone has referred to my blog as just Time Passing. Hey, you can call me anything, just don't call me late to din--errr, ahhh...

But I digress. The beauty of this Award is that it is self-replicating, being deliberately designed as a meme, as explained in the original post on The Thinking Blog, where this Award originally originated in the before-time, the long, long ago (namely, February 11, 2007)--here's a Wikipedia entry on blog Memetags which provides further explanation of how this memetic approach works. Anyway, this award may be an exercise in memery or memecraft, but the intent is to choose blogs that are genuinely interesting and thought-provoking.

So, having been tagged (which makes this the IT-Blog, I suppose) means that this is one of 5 blogs chosen by Paul (A Model Media Ecologist by Bob Blechman, a blog I've made reference to on a number of posts, was also chosen--congratulations, Bob!), and you can go to Paul's post to see the other three. Paul's blog was one of 5 chosen by someone else as a blog that made that other person think, and to accept the award he had to write a post with links to 5 blogs that make him think.

So, to accept this award from Paul, I have to write a post with links to 5 blogs that make me think. That's the first of the 3 participation rules. Actually, there's nothing in the rules that would keep me from naming blogs that already have been named by others, such as Paul's and Bob's. But I think that would go against the spirit of the award.

So, what can I say. The competition was fierce, but here are my Final Five:

5 Blogs That Make Me Think

Digital Ethnography ... a blog made by Michael Wesch and his colleagues and students, "a working group of Kansas State University students and faculty dedicated to exploring and extending the possibilities of digital ethnography" ... Most recent post (May 15, 2007): "Great video about our project by The Chronicle"

Machina Memorialis “the matrix of a reminiscing cogitation, shuffling and collating ‘things’ stored in a random-access memory scheme” ... a blog kept by John Walter while completing his PhD in the Department of English at Saint Louis University where he also works as the processing archivist of Walter J. Ong Manuscript Collection... Most recent post (May 14, 2007): "CW 2007: Session 8.2: Orality and Literacy 2.0"

..towards the knowledge society.. where the real and the virtual converge ... a blog written by Charlene Croft... Most recent post (May 11, 2007): "A new survey... On social networking sites..."

Douglas Rushkoff's Weblog ... a blog courtesy of Doug Rushkoff, natch. Most recent post (April 20, 2007): "New Interview"

Corey Anton's Blog ... written, directed, and produced by Corey Anton. Most recent post (May 10, 2007): "MUST READ: Heady Aphorisms"

*Please note that the opinions expressed in these blogs are not necessarily the opinions of the management of this blog.

Now, please join me in congratulating these 5 fine blogists, Mike, John, Charlene, Doug, and Corey. Take a bow, people!

Now, being listed on my list is honor enough, I know, but to actually claim the award and participate in this memetag (sounds German, doesn't it: Ve getz? Das es verbotten! Gutt memetag! Schweinhunt!) you have to follow the following instructions (which I take from that original post):

Should you choose to participate, please make sure you pass this list of rules to the blogs you are tagging. I thought it would be appropriate to include them with the meme.

The participation rules are simple:

1. If, and only if, you get tagged, write a post with links to 5 blogs that make you think,
2. Link to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the meme,
3. Optional: Proudly display the 'Thinking Blogger Award' with a link to the post that you wrote (here is an alternative silver version if gold doesn't fit your blog). [You can display the award in a post and also on the layout of your blog.]

That was that! Please, remember to tag blogs with real merits, i.e. relative content, and above all - blogs that really get you thinking!

It's all very self-reflexive, but after all, that's Alfred Korzybski's Third Non-Aristotelian Principle of Thought, speaking general semantically. But it's also very communal--those who would be honored must give honor in return.


And it's a way for me to say, "I like you, I really really like you."