Were Secret Societies The First Social Networks?

I am not a Freemason but i have been asked more than once to don the apron and swear the oaths..

I have also been told that Freemasonry is not a secret society, It is a society with secrets.

Never-the-less, it was the thought of being admitted to a secret society that attracted me to the idea of joining the Freemasons. I have an unhealthy fascination with the unknown.

Freemasonry has a mysterious history going back hundreds of years and it’s symbolism and iconography is embedded within our language, architecture and history.

One thing I didn’t quite understand when visiting a Masonic Lodge during a recruitment meeting was the rule asking you not talk about work, politics or religion.

Now, arguments often accompany political and religious discussion, so i could understand why those topics may be frowned upon. But I thought this would be just the place for movers and shakers, the people in positions of power to ‘Get Things Done’.. Where deals were made and projects started. How can this happen if all you have is small talk?

Now I think I get it.

Perhaps In one way Freemasonry is one of the Wests first social networks. Albeit a little more exclusive than the ones we have today. The small talk like the kind we see in our online social media networks was and is vital to build trust.

I imagine the Lodge meetings to be formal in some ways. Packed with ceremony and learning and the bar/social time afterward, the place where I’ve been invited to sample the subsidised beer, is where you shoot the breeze and get a feel for those you are connecting with.

Some of us do the same online. Twitter is a good example of people getting involved in small talk before contacts and connections are formally cemented. It may be at a conference or a social media get together where things move on to the next level. A quiet corner is found and business is done.

Here is the five minute chat with A Knights Templar Priest that started me thinking about how we ultimately use small talk to feel around for those we feel we can trust. In business, in play, in life..

I am sure much of this is human nature, but there still seems to be practised rules of engagement and now, more than ever, we see a blurring of those lines of when we should and shouldn’t open up to strangers. How speaking your mind in a public place can get you noticed by many but only the few who share their thoughts, no matter how trivial, get to play the game.

We all may appear to be ‘open and transparent’ but I’ll wager many of us keep the finer details of our business transactions behind closed doors.

My AudioBoo Podcast

Well I never. In only three days AudioBoo has metamorphosed before my eyes into a simple, intuitive podcasting solution.

It’s been around for longer than that (read my blog for more info) but I just took a look at my AudioBoo iTunes Feed and i have done what appears to be 30 mini podcasts in 3 days!

My ‘normal’ podcast is only in the 40’s!.. OK.. some will argue that they are a little more honed and probably better quality than some of my mini rants and rambles but who cares? Think of how easy it is now to podcast, albeit limited to 5 minutes. Think of all the people without the technical know how to hand code an XML file. It takes me literally hours to do my normal podcast so i can see the finished item on iTunes.. I can now do it in seconds.

Yes you need an iPhone but this will not be so in the future. And besides, look at the kit you used to need. Even on the cheap you are looking at some kind of audio recorder and a computer. Some people use mixers. Now all you need is a free app AudioBoo and an iPhone.

I guess the reason why I go on and on about how i am impressed with all of this is that I have a feeling we are going to see so many newly inspired multimedia producers not only equipped with the tech but using it in new and innovative ways. These new producers won’t be fault finding for 8 hours at a time after 5 hours of making a podcast wondering why their show hasn’t appeared in iTunes. I am not going to miss any of that.

I feel that once again I have moved from developing my own film to taking my first Polaroid. Yes it requires less work and you have not sweat blood to get the final result. Perhaps it does seem a little disposable and the purists will see it as a tweet next to a well thought out and composed blog post.

It doesn’t make the final work any less valuable. The world online is moving pretty fast now. I listen to fewer and fewer 40 minute podcasts and more and more shorter ones. I am chosing the Haiku over the ‘Long Poem‘.

This doesn’t mean i am going to stop doing my longer podcast editied in garageband.. not yet.

But it does mean you have something else to subscribe to.. If you want. Something shorter, quicker, rawer, off the cuff, unedited, not a programme, not an edited broadcast.. A little slice of life. A moment in time. An audio tweet. A Boo.

Subscribe to my AudioBoo’s i iTunes

And to my older longer podcast here.

2008 a journey with friends

The Documentally podcast in it’s iTunes form started in 2006, i started video blogging and using twitter in 2007 but it was 2008 that felt like social media really took off for me.

Maybe because I felt like I was no longer just a photographer. My ability to take photos and document things was now just one shade on a growing multimedia palette of skills that had community in mind.

I guess things really took off with my trip into Jordan for the United Nations. This was a big job for me, the ground covered, audio interviews, photos and final editing into a podcast assembled with the assistance of people like Phil Sands and Bill Cammack. It was in Jordan I introduced an Iraqi Refugee to Seesmic. This blew his mind that he could reach out into the homes of the western world and report first hand what he was going through whilst escaping with only his life from the mess that was/is Iraq.

I felt this would be an incredibly important use for video conversation platforms. Today they seem to concentrate on conversations with celebrity and have not yet been adopted by areas of the worlds community in real need of talking about their plight. Hopefully myself and Mike Sizemore will be able to push the use of video conversational platforms in the political sphere. We have already had great success using Qik during talks with political party leaders with Thompson Reuters, thanks to people like @ilicco.

Shortly after Jordan was a meetup in Paris, then SXSW in Austin, Texas. This was made possible by more sponsorship. Jeff Pulver bought the tickets and myself and Phil Campbell’s socializing was more than covered by Seesmic. It was here that many online friendships were cemented and connections made. People who’s lives I still follow daily and think of as good friends. Some of these friendships were fortified more with my trip to New York for Podcamp NYC 2.0. Also made possible with sponsorship from Seesmic.

There are too many people to name with whom friendships were made and are still maintained. If you look at my Twitter friends and scroll back to the first 30 or so pages.. these are the people from this time. These are the people I would do most anything for. The web weaving warriors who have made sense of this digital wasteland.

After SXSW I was bridging out from mobile media making and into Consulting. Geert Van Kesteren commissioned me to fly out to Amsterdam and help him with his media mountain. Towers of hard drives containing incredible photo stories waiting to be reformatted into online portfolios, podcasts, films anything that gave them new life.

Las Vegas was another big event of the year made possible with the help of Steve Purkiss, @Kosso’s Phreadz and The Open University. In fact Phreadz and The OU have gone on to play a massive part in many more of this years adventures. Berlin Web 2.0 was made infinitely more interesting and Geeknbury really came together with the online participation from those that could not make it.

Work for me this year has been a pleasure. Which is just as well, if i’m not doing something for an assignment, I am doing more of the same for the love of it. It was great working with Carl (@FellowCreative) and the University of Creative Arts online projects. Speaking at places like the UCA and the MDDA really punctuate the year nicely and allow me to learn through talking more about what it is we do.

I finished this year by running video blogging courses. A full day of looking at kit, learning how to use it, filming editing uploading and dissemination.

If you had asked me at the beginning of 2008 what i would be doing throughout the year, I would have had no idea how fast and how far this social media wave would travel. Surf’s up and it’s 10 foot and tubing.

If you ask me now I’ll say I just want to stay on the surfboard, anything else is a bonus.

I look forward to doing more with these people in 2009. More projects with the likes of Dave @BuddhaMagnet. More experimental stuff with the OU, more teaching with the MDDA.. More with, Nick Butler, @sleepydog, Phil Campbell, Mike Sizemore.. Just more.

Of course I have the little matter of a baby arriving between March and April so my focus may alter somewhat in the first quarter of this year. If I thought 2008 was epic, 2009 it is bound to be more so.

This blog post accompanies a podcast I have rushed out in the last couple of hours of 2008. Not really a concise summery. Just a ramble whilst walking the dog on a cold December night. Trying to get my head around the year and at the same time trying not to freeze to death in the dark Northamptonshire countryside.

You can subscribe to my ever so neglected podcast in the iTunes store.

If you feel you can add to this please comment. It’s great to get feedback, thoughts and ideas.

Don’t forget you can support this blog here and a review on my podcast in Itunes may do more good than bad.

I won’t ask any more from you other than to stay in touch. Communication got us here.. Staying connected will carry us through. A journey with friends.

Episode 44 – Kiss Privacy Goodbye

Back on June the 25th, for the second year running myself and Dr John Perivolaris, visited George Orwell’s grave for his birthday.

This year we were accompanied by Phil Campbell and Brian Jones and as we picnicked in honour of Eric Arthur Blair, we also discussed our ever diminishing civil liberties, asking what is public and wondering If George Orwell could ever have known that it would not be the tyranny of socialism but the triumph of capitalism which is making us kiss our privacy goodbye?

If you have not subscribed to the podcast (free) in Itunes already, you can listen to the mp3 here

And if you would like a visual referance to the day, check out these great little films of the day made by  Phil Campbell .. This one in HD and this one shot on the Flip Ultra

Thanks for stopping by.

Episode 43 – There And Back Again

The first half of this podcast was recorded in the company of Philip Campbell in March 2008 on a flight to Newark airport before going on to SXSW in Austin Texas.

The second half was recorded on the flight back to London.

We talk about hacking, podcamp uk, Seesmic, Qik, Blip TV, Pulver TV, social media and how to make Sloe Gin.

I edited it one month later in April, on another flight to Newark this time on my own and heading to PodcampNYC 2.0.

The song entitled HTML in the middle was emailed to me by Erin of the band ‘The Hot Toddies‘. I highly reccommend checking them out HERE.

If you have not subscribed to the podcast (free) in Itunes already, you can listen to the mp3 here

Episode 42 – Life In The Shadows

Sorry for the delay in getting this into my podcast feed. I had some strange issues with the way i had encoded it and it took a little bit of time to get the file just right so as it would show up in my feed.

I am guessing many of you have already seen this. To you guys I say once again, thank you for your support and also for passing this on to others..

To those that haven’t, and I know there are many who download the podcast that never visit any of my sites, here is a brief outline..

The fifth anniversary of the start of the Iraq War has just passed, and there is speculation that the engagement may continue yet another five years, if not more. To date, approximately 4,000 American soldiers have been killed in combat.

While the loss of combat troops is certainly tragic, even more stunning is a recent World Health Organization report based on Iraqi Health Ministry figures which estimates that 151,000 Iraqi civilians were killed between March 2003, the start of the invasion, and June 2006.

Many of the reports of civilian deaths are disputed. What cannot be argued, however, is another grave consequence of the Iraq War: the displacement crisis as a mass exodus of Iraqis flee the instabilities and ever-increasing sectarian violence at home, tearing their families apart.

In mid-January 2008, with the support of the United Nations High Commission For Refugees (UNHCR), I traveled to Amman, Jordan to photograph and record a few of these families trapped in a no-man’s land; asylum seekers looking for refuge, too afraid to return to their blood-soaked country.

Here are a few of their stories:

The film can also be viewed as a .wmv file here.. http://www.unhcr.org/video/iraqi-refugees-in-jordan.wmv
…and downloaded as a real media file here.. http://www.unhcr.org/video/iraqi-refugees-in-jordan.rm
For more information please check out.. The UNHCR Multimedia pages

To download this film to your ipod or mobile device please subscribe to the podcast at The Documentally Podcast Feed

Episode 41 – Two Clips

Whilst feeling a little bit guilty for not having posted a (self-made) podcast in a while I decided that I would paste a couple of random recordings together and stick the outcome into my feed. Forgive me if it is a little rough around the edges..

It’s not my normal fare.. but it is what it is.

If you have not subscribed to the podcast (free) in Itunes already, you can listen to the mp3 here

Episode 40 – An interview in Jordan

Well here is a turn up for the books.. And a handy one at that as I am bowled over with my various projects at the moment so i am posting this interview with me in my feed to not only save me some valuble editing time but also to introduce and thank a British podcaster who lives in Canada called David Bailey.David Phoned me up whilst i was working In Amman Jordan and we had time for this quick interview. David’s content can be found at http://dfbmbe.wordpress.com and more of my other updates can be found at www.OurManInside.com

You can also stream the podcast here.. DFBMBE Blog

Many thanks to Dave in taking the time to call me in jordan and for making the interview available as a podcast.

correction: During the interview i should have said… It is the largest refugee crisis to hit the Middle East in 60 years. We must not forget Afghanistan.

Episode 39 – Freeganism

Meet Alf, he used to manipulate people using fear and greed to make them buy products they didn’t need.

Now with his friend Bob and many others, he follows one of the paths of Freeganism, shopping from the backs of stores, without money, dumpster diving to utilize some of the many ton’s of waste food and other products consumers and suppliers throw away each year.

As we remember the words of the economist and philosopher John Stuart Mill when he said.. “If you want to destroy a system, refuse to buy it’s products”, Alf agrees it’s a dangerous message.

If you have not subscribed to the podcast (free) in Itunes already, you can listen to the mp3 here

For more information visit:

www.freegan.org.uk

www.freeganism.org

www.OurManInside.com

Please feel free to email me at the usual place.

Episode 38 – Bar Chat

A little chat in a bar under the Curzon Cinema in London, England. I am joined by John Perivolaris an independent photographer and film maker Richard Azia (Warzabidul)

We talk about protesting, a new take on the proliferation of CCTV in the UK and other bits and bobs.

Here are some more handy links…

The Town Crier at the beginning of the podcast is the world famous Peter Moore

Join the flickr group Surveillance Mirrior

Helena Smith photographer

Taryn Simon photographer

If you have not subscribed to the podcast (free) in Itunes already, you can listen to the mp3 here

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