[rowan]

Hi all,
My name is Rowan Wolf and I am an editor for a relatively new collaborative weblog called Radical Noesis. This journal focuses on peak oil and resource depletion, global warming, environment, and alternative paths. We are looking for quality submissions from guest authors (as well as new collaborative authors).

If you have an article that you want to share with the world, please submit them, While not all articles will be accepted, we are inclusive.

Please look at the submissions guidelines.

The site focuses on analysis and social impacts, rather than technical issues, but technical papers will certainly be considered.

I am personally interested in environmental justice issues and feel that it gets left out of many discussions of the ramifications of peak oil and global warming. I am particularly interested in submissions addressing this issue.

Please feel free to contact me with questions or issues. If you wish to submit an article, please read the submission guidelines first.

In the struggle,
Rowan

[NeoPeasant]

I think spreading the discussion of an issue over too many forums dilutes and weakens all of them. Rather than create yet another peak oil discussion site, why don't you just participate in this one?

[rowan]

I appreciate discussions, and plan to participate with the fine folks here at this forum. However, I believe there also needs to be space for a more extended and formal presentation of ideas. I do not come to forums to read articles and detailed analysis. I come to forums to share ideas and engage in dialogue. I don't see the two venues as diluting each other, rather as reinforcing each other.

My site is a "blog" that allows discussion as well, but it is a semi-structured discussion. Forums are better for a free flow of ideas. In my opinion anyway.

In both venues, one can develop and extend community.

My guess is that a number of the members of this forum also have websites. I also do not see those as competing with each other. While sites in an interest area may "compete," but I see it as each reaching a different "community," and linking people into a broader "network" of ideas and information.

I am certainly not trying to take anything away from this fine forum other than the stimulation of good discussion and information. This forum is a resource, and part of my larger network. I found it through the Peak Oil Webring at Flying Talking Donkey. A member of this site (Ian McPherson of Downunder read a request for information at my site and responded with excellent information.

I teach as a profession, and one thing that I have learned is that not everyone responds to the same thing. Someone can hear the same information 50 times and not get it. Then someone says something, or frames something, in a way that connects with that person.

My post inviting writers to submit articles is not meant to draw people away from this forum or to "dilute" it in any way.

Thank you for your thoughts and concerns. I will keep them in mind. I hope that my site brings more people to this forum which is a tremendous resource, and that my site can share some of the wisdom collected here in a different venue.

Sincerely,
rowan

[k_semler]

This may be OT, but what is a blog? Is it like an electronic independent editorial column, an independant media source, or it is just an online journal? Also, what is the purpose of a blog? Since hearing about it 3 years ago, I still have not found out what it is. In either format, what differs the "blog" from a website that I open and rant on it? Yes, it may just be HTML 4.01, but it still conveys the same message. What exactly is the purpose of the blog?

[bart]

Good luck with your online publication, rowan.

I think it's important to move beyond the forum format, into articles and essays that are more thought out. We write off the top of our heads on peakoil.com, argue for a while, then the discussion evanesces.

Three weeks later, the subject comes up again, a new set of people argue about it and it's forgotten again.

It's a combination of group therapy, college bull session, and letters-to-the-editor. That's fine, as far as it goes.

But at some point one wants to read/write pieces that have depth, that are substantial. That's how one grows intellectually.

[Aaron]

Greeting Rowan & welcome.

It's normally bad forum etiquette to incite members to another related forum.

However, your site is a blog, (which we offer as well, but has languished from lack of participation), & so is not a direct competitor with this site.

However,

I looked around your site, & cannot find a link to peakoil.com

You don't owe us anything, including a link. But using our forum to solicit visitors, and not even giving a return link is...

Well you get the idea.

That said, I would be happy to discuss ways to collaborate with your people & help each other to grow traffic.

PAX

[Barbara]

Have I ever told you that I love Aaron?

Anyway, k_semler, I have you exact feelings about blogs. The useless of the useless things ever invented inside and outside the Net.

[rowan]

Aaron
peakoil.com is on my Resource Page under the Peak Oil Heading. I did not register for this forum to solicit visitors, though that would be a happy by-product. I joined up because I wanted to participate in your discussions. I also had hoped to reach out to the community here to offer the opportunity for those who are (or want to) write articles, a possible venue to share them. I am sorry, if that was poor etiquette. No slight was intended.

k_semler
Blogs are a bit difficult to describe as they can be so many different things. Most probably fall closer to a "journal" because they are updated frequently - usually every day or so. They are more dynamic and interactive than a static web page, and less dynamic than most bulletin board type systems. Most allow readers to add comments and discussion to pieces that are posted.

Perhaps it would help if I (briefly) share my own journey into blogging. I started with a webpage that was my personal "news clippings." My students kept asking where I got information. Then I added a page that was links to sites I found useful. etc. Pretty soon, I had a site with around 20 pages and maintaining it was getting out of hand.

A former student of mine suggested I try some blogging software. Most blogging software is kind of a "content management system." It brought my rapidly proliferating website under one umbrella, and made accessing and retrieving information much more efficient. Then I started putting together what I was reading into articles. And there I was ... "blogging."

In a relatively short time I found a whole other side (and more possibilities) for blogging. I had a "community" of people with whom I was interacting. Some of them I knew - they were my friends and students, others I did not. I found I was in regular open conversation with a number of folks - something that is not really possible on a standard website.

Technically there are a number of differences across the various presentation "platforms" - web pages/site, blogs, forums, etc - but I am not that "technical" to present it in any kind of a cogent way.

Bart
Thank you.

[Aaron]

Thanks Bart...

no hard feelings

[Pops]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Aaron', ' ')

It's normally bad forum etiquette to incite members...

PAX

[rowan]

Gads, I didn't mean to incite anyone, but apparently I did.

[bart]

Hi Aaron,

Didn't mean to offend (not sure whether I did, but apologies just in case). I've enjoyed spending time on peakoil.com and commend you for the service you're providing. It is an amazing site.

To describe peakoilcom as I did is nothing against peakoil.com... it's just a limitation of the format.

I'm on the lookout for quality articles about PO and energy, and it's hard to find them. Either they too narrow (typical of scientific or technical papers) or they are written off the top of one's head, without much research or background reading. Some of the pieces that appear in forums and maillists are good, but they disappear all too quickly.

If peakoil.com were to spawn people who could write deeply and intelligently about energy, whether they publish here or elsewhere, that should be counted a great success.

[Aaron]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'H')ave I ever told you that I love Aaron?