Last night I discovered Network(ed) Rhetoric, a blog for a graduate course at Syracuse University. They're looking at how recent trends in network studies and social software connect with issues in rhetoric and composition and vice versa. I found all kinds of thought-provoking goodies that I'll write about when I have a bit more time to percolate on them. This site led me to Theory Canal, which featured a fun little game you can try next time you're lacking inspiration for what to post on your blog.
It's called the Book Meme 123.5 (originally from the chutry experiment). Here's how it works:
1. Grab the nearest book.
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the sentence in your journal along with these instructions.
5. Don’t search around and look for the “coolest” book you can find. Do what’s actually next to you.
I'm part way through John Winsor's Beyond the Brand, so I picked that up and flipped to p. 123. The fifth sentence isn't inspiring by itself, but -- bending the rules a bit -- the fourth is:
"Trust is a product of active listening."
What a great statement. I was thinking yesterday about "customer relationship management" and how CRM couldn't come close to actually building relationships. Relationships are built on trust, and trust is a product of active listening. If you're trying to build relationships with customers without listening mechanisms in place (like forums, blogs, users groups, non-focus-group qualitative research, etc.), then you're just spinning your wheels.
So what does 123.5 inspire you to say today?
"Or at least that had been his speculation."
Fits well for me, considering I just made a decision regarding where I will work next year, after I graduate from college.
Posted by: Adam | March 22, 2005 at 09:21 AM
Hmmm, I don't see any books around here. Piles of paper a plenty, but no books. Ok, here's the manual for my MIG welder, but it doesn't have enough pages. What would the "closest" PDF on my harddrive be? Would that count? Oh well, I have plenty to write about on my blog anyways.
Posted by: Derek Woolverton | March 14, 2005 at 11:54 PM
Jennifer, thanks. I just started blogging in the Network(ed) Rhetorics course and this is my first connect to another blog outside the course--very exciting! The course is utterly fascinating, as I hope you can tell from our group blog.
Posted by: hj | March 11, 2005 at 11:50 AM
John,
I was wondering when you were going to pipe it with a thanks. Does your book come in an Audio version from our favorite on-line provider?
Posted by: Bruce DeBoer | March 11, 2005 at 06:19 AM
Jennifer, thanks for reading my book!
Posted by: John Winsor | March 10, 2005 at 08:50 PM
Ok...here goes. The closest book to me at this very moment is Rick Bayless' "Authentic Mexican: Regional Cooking from the Heart of Mexico."
123.5...does it inspire you?
"An equally delicious and varied assortment of cazuela and plancha soft taco fillings begins after the following general directions."
Hmmm...inspired to hunger? Or am I simply hungering for inspiration?
Posted by: Bill Holsinger-Robinson | March 10, 2005 at 05:39 PM
From Alexander Dumas' "The Count of Monte Cristo":
"You see, fear has had an effect on him."
Posted by: Matt | March 10, 2005 at 04:55 PM
From James Stewart's "DisneyWar"
page 122, sentence 4 (I had to bend a litte as well)
"It is amazing how a single creative act can change everything" ~Michael Eisner in his 1991 Letter to Shareholders
You are right, Jennifer, now I have something to blog about!
Posted by: Travis McMenimon | March 10, 2005 at 04:34 PM
"And he asked them, "But who do you say I am?" Peter answered him, "You are the Christ." (The Navarre Bible, St. Mark 8:29)
St. Peter's profession of faith is reported here in a shorter form than in Mt 16:18-19. Still, St. Mark's narrative shows St. Peter's role clearly: he is the first to come forward and affirm the messiahship of Jesus. In this passage St. Peter is promised primacy over the whole Church, a primacy which Jesus will confer on him after his resurrection (Jn 21:15-18).
Posted by: Harry Joiner | March 10, 2005 at 04:32 PM
your comment on CRM is quite appropriate. current crm tools - Siebel for one - are really more of a data repository than a 2 way communication. depending upon the set up, customers can request action and it is recorded into the crm tool. however, the feedback loop after that is human dependent. more importantly, the entire process is more reactive and i think your point is tilted toward proactive communication.
so, from my perspective and experience, crm tools are more of a data repository/reactive mechanism. what you want is a tool/concept that actively seeks out customer inputs that communicates actions/responses on a frequent real time basis. without a doubt, some intelligent blogging tool vendor could create such a tool. sounds to me like one of the evolutionary branches of blogging is about to sprout...
Posted by: jbr | March 10, 2005 at 10:15 AM
Ok, this isn't from the closest book, but it is from a classic: Selling The Invisible by Harry Beckwith. And the fifth sentence on page 123 is also a classic:
"If you think you can afford not to focus, think of Sears."
Posted by: Dan Alsip | March 10, 2005 at 08:26 AM
Ok ... I'll play. Oooops. The book I'm reading has only 1.4 pages, hmmmmmm. OK - here's another: Truth, Lies & Advertising by Jon Steel. The fifth sentence on P. 123:
"But the more interviews I conducted, the more complicated the problem seemed to become, as one partner after another gave me a different perspective based on what he or she DID as opposed to how that might be useful to a client."
I think maybe John Winsor and Jon Steel have been talking. Similar message if you squint your brain a little.
Posted by: Bruce DeBoer | March 10, 2005 at 07:41 AM
Sentence 5, page 123, THE ANALYSIS OF THE SELF: A Systematic Approach to the Psychoanalytic Treatment of Narcissistic Personality Disorders, by Heinz Kohut, MD (International Universities Press, 1971):
"One further, and last, set of arguments in favor of using the term mirror transference for the whole group of transference phenomena that are the expression of teh therapeutic mobilization of the grandiose self: it may well be that the mirror transference in the narrower sense is the only one that corresponds, at least in approximation, to a recognizable developmental phase, while the silent merger with the analyst through the extension of the analysand's grandiose self and the alter-ego transference (twinship) are reinstatements of regressive postitions taken in early childhood (preoedipally) after the failure of the mirror stage."
Er, now I have to write a blog post about this?
I never realized how unscannable, how unready for web content, is the prolix, verbose writing of some psychoanalysts. Could I just blog about that? About writing that's too wordy? Too long-winded?
I love this book, though this is not one of my favorite sentences in it, Jennifer.
You have reminded me of a very smart, intellectual friend, Bennett Theissen.
If I liked a book, say of poetry, theology, philosophy, he would grab it, open to any page at random, read any sentence or paragraph at random, toss the book back to me and say:
"What's so great about that?"
...just to be funny, and maybe a little arrogant.
Let's not slide into Bibliomancy, the superstitious, obsessive-compulsive practice of endowing page 123, sentence 5 with super-normal powers that can guide or control one's life.
:^)
Posted by: steven streight aka vaspers the grate | March 10, 2005 at 06:39 AM