Apr 22

Written by: Joel Orr
4/22/2008 

Life goes by so fast! COFES 2008 was, well, outstanding - even more the prior ones, each of which outdid the ones before. But so much keeps going on! There is hardly time for thought, let alone reflection; stuff keeps happening too quickly for me to make sense of.

We're doing a much better job of posting stuff quickly; explore this site, and you will find recordings, videos, and some comments on what went on at COFES, with more to come - hopefully, before it's all old hat...

What do we do about this phenomenon that signal processing geeks call 'aliasing' - the challenges of representing a high-frequency set of events in a low-frequency medium. Stuff is pouring in as I sit here, and there is no way I can assimilate it all, let alone its implications. I can't even begin to assimilate the ruminations of gurus who are quick to analyze and summarize - and I certainly don't have time to think about how good those analyses are...I know I'm preaching to the converted here. You have told me, at COFES and elsewhere, that you experience this same "swamped" feeling.

I know that what most of us cherish from COFES is the personal connections we make there, the results of the "planned serendipity" that is the heart of COFES. How do you capture these events? Paper-based notes? Recordings? Pictures? Computer-based notes? Email threads? Blogs? Follow-up calls? I do all of these; they all contribute to my building of my personal web of connections.

What else do you do? How do you make sense of all this? What filters do you use? I need help, and I am more and more learning from the wisdom of crowds. C'mon, comment!