{ "attachments": [ "829f33104a49.png" ], "layout": "post", "title": "Social Media Cyborg", "tags": [ "web20", "social", "feeds", "metablogging", "ifttt", "hacks" ], "published": true, "date": "2011-11-04T19:00:00.000Z", "year": "2011", "month": "11", "day": "04", "isDir": true, "slug": "social-media-cyborg", "type": "entry", "postName": "2011-11-04-social-media-cyborg", "html": "

TL;DR: Since Google Reader lost it's sharing, I've decided to\nrevisit my \"social media strategy\". I'm plugging lots of things into\nother things. I feel like maybe I should write about this stuff.

\n


Started diagramming all my social media flows on LucidChart.

\n\n\n

This is what I do for fun

\n

Since I've mentioned in a few places that I'm a weirdo, I thought I\nmight spend some time explaining exactly what I mean by that. You see,\none of my hobbies is turning myself into a human content filter for\nfriends on the web.

\n

And, honestly, having my sharing habits shaken up by the\nReaderpocalypse makes it fun again.

\n

The image over to the right is an attempt I made to diagram some of my\nsocial media flow. It's incomplete, though: I'm a cheapsake and ran\nout of free objects in my diagram. So, I had to leave out at least a\nhalf-dozen more services and a dozen additional connections.\n(LucidChart is very nice, by the way.)

\n

In other words, ifttt.com is awesome

\n

In particular, I've finally spent some time with ifttt.com. It's\nlike Automator for the social web. It lets you define event\ntriggers from one site that cause actions on another site.

\n

So, I've gone crazy and created a bunch of tasks that make things like\nthe following possible:

\n\n

What's the point?

\n

The important principle here is that I'm lazy. If there's a single\nbutton to click somewhere that expresses my happiness about a thing,\nI'd like to click it and have that happiness shared and archived\nelsewhere without me doing much (or anything) more. The scheme I have\nnow feels pretty good for that, and ifttt.com does a huge amount\nto help.

\n

The other important thing is that I am at the center of these\nconnections. I don't live entirely on any single service, and\nanything I care about is archived where I can easily grab it for\nbackups or mashups. Should any particular service node in this web\nfail, I can probably do without, find an alternative, or build one\nmyself.

\n

My goal is to eventually replace as many of these nodes as possible\nwith self-hosted or at least Open Source derived services. (Though, of\ncourse, I'm also lazy and my friends are where they are. So, that goal\nwill take awhile.)

\n

One more thing...

\n

I've got an idea for my next book simmering. And, since I've\nso far managed to write books about the major things I've done for\nfun, I feel I'd be remiss if I skipped this stuff. I mean, I sort of\ncovered the same ground all in my first and second books, but\nthings have progressed since then.

\n

What this means is that all the above feels like a warm up for the\ncoding and prosing I'll need to do. I just need to get my shit\ntogether and carve out the time to make it happen.

\n\n", "body": "**TL;DR**: Since Google Reader lost it's sharing, I've decided to\r\nrevisit my \"social media strategy\". I'm plugging lots of things into\r\nother things. I feel like maybe I should write about this stuff.\r\n\r\n
Started diagramming all my social media flows on LucidChart.\r\n\r\n## This is what I do for fun\r\n\r\nSince I've mentioned in a few places that I'm a weirdo, I thought I\r\nmight spend some time explaining exactly what I mean by that. You see,\r\none of my hobbies is turning myself into a human content filter for\r\nfriends on the web.\r\n\r\nAnd, honestly, having my sharing habits shaken up by the\r\n[Readerpocalypse][] makes it fun again.\r\n\r\nThe image over to the right is an attempt I made to diagram some of my\r\nsocial media flow. It's incomplete, though: I'm a cheapsake and ran\r\nout of free objects in my diagram. So, I had to leave out at least a\r\nhalf-dozen more services and a dozen additional connections.\r\n([LucidChart][] is very nice, by the way.)\r\n\r\n[lucidchart]: http://www.lucidchart.com/\r\n\r\n## In other words, ifttt.com is awesome\r\n\r\nIn particular, I've finally spent some time with [ifttt.com][]. It's\r\nlike [Automator][] for the social web. It lets you [define event\r\ntriggers from one site that cause actions on another site][recipes]. \r\n\r\nSo, I've gone crazy and created a bunch of tasks that make things like\r\nthe following possible:\r\n\r\n* [Pinboard][] bookmarks based on favorites from\r\n [Twitter][twitterfavs], [identi.ca][identicafavs], [YouTube][],\r\n [Last.fm][], and my [Kindle][] highlights. I'm turning my\r\n [Pinboard][] account into both my personal social media archive and\r\n a Google Reader sharing replacement, and I don't even have to beg\r\n for new features at [Pinboard][].\r\n\r\n* [Tumblr][] photo posts based on [Reddit up-votes][reddit], [Flickr\r\n favorites][], and [Pinboard][] bookmarks tagged \"[to:tumblr][]\".\r\n Since creating it, I've left my [Tumblr][] almost entirely\r\n neglected—but now with [ifttt.com][], I can route almost every nifty\r\n image I find over to that thing. It's the right side of my outboard\r\n brain to the [Pinboard][] left.\r\n\r\n* Published items from from my private installation of [Tiny Tiny RSS][] \r\n end up shared on [Pinboard][]. This pretty much scratches my itch\r\n for feed reader sharing, since [Google nixed those features from\r\n Reader][readerpocalypse].\r\n\r\n* Starred items from [tt-rss][tiny tiny rss] get sent to\r\n [Instapaper][], so I can read them on my [Kindle][] later. If [email\r\n delivery of documents start working][ipemail], then I'll have a\r\n personal long-attention span newspaper delivered regularly to that\r\n gadget.\r\n\r\n* Posts from [Google+][] get copied over to [Facebook][], because I\r\n don't want to pick sides.\r\n\r\n* In fact, almost everything I do everywhere eventually ends up posted\r\n to [Facebook][], because I almost never post anything in person over\r\n there. I do have friends and family over there and respond to\r\n comments, though.\r\n\r\n## What's the point?\r\n\r\nThe important principle here is that I'm lazy. If there's a single\r\nbutton to click somewhere that expresses my happiness about a thing,\r\nI'd like to click it and have that happiness shared and archived\r\nelsewhere without me doing much (or anything) more. The scheme I have\r\nnow feels pretty good for that, and [ifttt.com][] does a huge amount\r\nto help.\r\n\r\nThe other important thing is that **I am at the center of these\r\nconnections**. I don't live entirely on any single service, and\r\nanything I care about is archived where I can easily grab it for\r\nbackups or mashups. Should any particular service node in this web\r\nfail, I can probably do without, find an alternative, or build one\r\nmyself. \r\n\r\nMy goal is to eventually replace as many of these nodes as possible\r\nwith self-hosted or at least Open Source derived services. (Though, of\r\ncourse, I'm also lazy and my friends are where they are. So, that goal\r\nwill take awhile.)\r\n\r\n## One more thing...\r\n\r\nI've got [an idea for my next book simmering][book]. And, since I've\r\nso far managed to write books about the major things I've done for\r\nfun, I feel I'd be remiss if I skipped this stuff. I mean, I sort of\r\ncovered the same ground all in [my first][] and [second][] books, but\r\nthings have progressed since then.\r\n\r\nWhat this means is that all the above feels like a warm up for the\r\ncoding and prosing I'll need to do. I just need to get my shit\r\ntogether and carve out the time to make it happen.\r\n\r\n[my first]: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0764597582?ie=UTF8&tag=0xdecafbad01-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&c%0D%0Areative=9325&creativeASIN=0764597582\r\n[second]: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0470037857?ie=UTF8&tag=0xdecafbad01-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&%0D%0Acreative=9325&creativeASIN=0470037857\r\n[book]: https://github.com/lmorchard/tinkering-with-activity-streams\r\n[google+]: https://plus.google.com/114487965928288927815/posts\r\n[ipemail]: https://twitter.com/lmorchard/status/132482782709555200\r\n[flickr favorites]: http://www.flickr.com/photos/deusx/favorites/\r\n[twitter]: http://twitter.com/lmorchard\r\n[recipes]: http://ifttt.com/people/lmorchard\r\n[facebook]: http://www.facebook.com/lmorchard\r\n[instapaper]: http://www.instapaper.com/\r\n[tiny tiny rss]: http://tt-rss.org/\r\n[last.fm]: http://www.last.fm/user/deusx/library/loved\r\n[youtube]: http://www.youtube.com/user/lmorchard\r\n[identicafavs]: http://identi.ca/lmorchard/favorites\r\n[twitterfavs]: https://twitter.com/lmorchard/favorites\r\n[kindle]: https://kindle.amazon.com/profile/Leslie-Michael-Orchard/1056858\r\n[reddit]: http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/pipe.run?_id=6f374b46f1b9a132972b262f2d85b7db&_render=rss\r\n[to:tumblr]: http://pinboard.in/u:deusx/t:to:tumblr\r\n[tumblr]: http://lmorchard.tumblr.com/\r\n[pinboard]: http://pinboard.in/u:deusx\r\n[yahoo! pipes]: http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/\r\n[automator]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automator_%28software%29\r\n[ifttt.com]: http://ifttt.com\r\n[readerpocalypse]: http://decafbad.com/blog/2011/11/01/readerpocalypse\r\n\r\n\r\n", "parentPath": "./content/posts/archives/2011/2011-11-04-social-media-cyborg", "path": "2011/11/04/social-media-cyborg", "thumbnail": "/2011/11/04/social-media-cyborg/829f33104a49.png", "needsBuild": true, "prevPostPath": "2011/11/01/readerpocalypse", "prevPostTitle": "The Readerpocalypse, or Occupy Google Reader", "nextPostPath": "2012/05/16/please-learn-to-code", "nextPostTitle": "Please Do Learn To Code" }