But just because you can’t have opinions about all things doesn’t mean you can’t have opinions about any things. There are some things we know for sure. These might be minor—how to treat your parents, how to grow tomatoes, how to build a house. We each have a few such things. Start there with your feet firmly planted and see how it feels. Then take a few small steps until you reach a place that still feels firm, but where nobody else is standing. Then try to make something beautiful with what you see.
Jonathan Harris writes about a new online landscape, suited for meaningful and deep human expression on “World Building in a Crazy World”. Even if you don’t care about the guy’s artistic/narrative work, the thoughts he gathers on what goals and problems its builders face make you ponder what part you play in making self-expression better for you and those for whom you care.
Tumblr, to me, is a landmark in the world he describes: it’s a freeform enough a tool that you can mix and match whatever pieces of the Internet (and of yourself) you wish to share, neither falling on the terseness and immediateness of other services nor being required to be long-winded in preset ways. The freedom to alternate a nice reblog with your (possibly boring) considerations about the world sprinkles Dashboards all around with variety and wonder, all perpetually renewed by the remixing capabilities the platform offers.
It also frees (and encourages) you to experiment with form. On Facebook and Twitter, you are usually constructing a compendium of banalities through the restricted paths they offer you; here, you’re constantly showing yourself through different lenses, allowing for implicit narratives that others can (and will) try to sew together, spellbound with how alike them, or completely opposite to them, you are. That, to me, is gold.
A year and a half after creating my account, this place maintains a nice balance between “Wooow!” and “Wow…” Seriously, guys: you make my life better in many, many sweet little ways. And even if this post remains buried among the hundreds of good stuff floating around here, I feel like thanking everyone who sweats to keep this sharp and running. Your success is nothing but deserved.
