And now for something completely different

I'm having a hard time readjusting to a non-blogger-based world, i.e., I'm at work. For those of you who've seen Being John Malkovich (yes, that's where I stole my blog title), this weekend was two days of malkovich-malkovich-malkovich -- just replace "malkovich" with "blog." Luckily, I can have lunch with Stone for a small fix of blogging to ease back into the real world. I'm trying to make this the last of my BloggerCon posts because, really, it's all been done (and done better) by others. And I really need to do some things that are not hypertextualized.

That said, here's quick rundown inside the mind of JenGarrett at BloggerCon:

• Why didn't I bring my laptop? It's just as cute as everyone else's. Oh, yeah, that's right, I can't listen, think, and type at the same time. How do these people think without a pen to twirl?


• On Weblogs and Journalism: Blogs are reality TV (oh, shit, I hate reality TV). Ed Cone says that nothing is closed to the "press" anymore because everyone is a potential journalist. What does this do to the idea of being "on the record"? How does this limit the idea of the public vs. private?


• The idea of maintaing a blog "as long as it’s fun": Sometimes my blog is difficult, and frustrating, and infuriating, and … fun. Sometimes I get the most value out of a post that was the least fun to write.


• On Blogging and Education: Someone from the audience asked if blogging was a life skill, or if, like singing, some should only do it at home? Kaye Trammell said that a blog offers a voice to those who want to speak. (And I, apparently, never want to shut up.)


• Why are we using blogging in education? We're attendees of short-attention-span theater already; why should we teach students to write in short bursts, without the kind of editing we claim is valuable? Do you need to learn how to write five pages well before you learn to write five lines well?


• From the Cluetrain Manifesto: Elizabeth Spiers doesn't look how I thought she would, and somehow, her voice doesn't match her face. Adam Curry says "we're all routers." Nuh-uh, not me.

We still haven't figured out what the power of weblogs are. Gotta work on that.