DOPPLR - a fascinating tool to enable serendipity

In 1996, I was wandering down a street in Kansas City when I unexpectedly ran into an old colleague of mine. It was a delightful encounter. We spent ten minutes or so catching up and reminiscing about great concerts we had attended together. I remember it now as if it happened yesterday.

This story may explain why I am in love with a new website called DOPPLR, which connects you and friends/colleagues and allows you to share information with them.

(I can hear you already. What, another social site? I'm already on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, seven Ning networks. Enough!)

DOPPLR's unique twist is that it allows you to share travel itineraries with your circle--something of exceptional utility if you travel much, and if members of your circle travel as well. It lets you know when members of your network are traveling to your town, or (coolest of all), when you and an acquaintance just happen to be traveling to the same place at the same time.

For example, even though I have a small circle in my DOPPLR network, I already learned of two folks who will be traveling to the same conference with me in San Francisco next month. This piece of information spurred me to email them and set up get-togethers.

I've discussed the benefits of networking again and again in this space. The new social tools allow you to keep up with a much larger circle of acquaintances. The catch is, since they're all virtual, they don't help much in actually getting together with members of your network if they're not in the neighborhood.

But DOPPLR does exactly that.

Tags:
web 2.0, websites, travel, networking, social networking

From The Mistake Bank: a comic mistake story (it's funny, too)

Please click the picture to view in a larger size.

There are lots of ways to tell a story. One perhaps underappreciated way is via comics--a narrative combination of words and drawings.

Comics artist Josh Neufeld contributed to the Mistake Bank the great story pictured above, "Past Perfect Progressive in Prague." Perhaps you'll identify with the awkwardness of adapting to a new place and culture.

Josh's most recent work is the comic book "A.D."--taking on perhaps the greatest mistake of our time, Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath. "A.D." follows the stories of six actual New Orleans residents from different neighborhoods and walks of life, through the calamity and thereafter. A powerful narrative containing real dialogue and settings, with hyperlinks to supporting documentation, it's truly an epic work. "A.D." is accessible on the SMITH Magazine site, and will be forthcoming as a printed book in summer 2009, the fourth anniversary of the hurricane.

Related posts:
"Understanding Comics"

Tags:
Mistake Bank, mistakes, comix, travel, culture

"Once Upon a Nation" teaches history through storytelling

My family went to Philadelphia for the US Independence Day weekend. Among other activities, we visited thirteen storytelling benches arrayed around the historic district. At these locations, storytellers told us tales about Revolutionary War-era figures and other notable people and events from Philadelphia's history, including:

• The first bank robbery in the US
• A Philadelphia witch trial
• The invention of bubble gum
• The escape of one of President George Washington's house slaves
  
• The hiking and camping adventures of a young boy who became a renowned artist and horticulturist.

Of all the cool things we did that weekend--visiting the Liberty Bell and touring Independence Hall (where the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution were debated), eating at a tavern where Jefferson ate--the stories were the most memorable part of the trip. Our five-year-old insisted that visiting all the benches was our highest priority for the weekend.

We attended several events featuring performers playing characters from the period--Ben Franklin, a Patriot soldier, a young aristocrat. You could hardly walk down the street without running into a printer, militia officer or milkmaid--in character always.

At night, we recounted the stories we'd heard that day. As we toured, we looked for references to story characters in the historic buildings.

All of the above are a product of Once Upon a Nation, a group charged with creating a "living history" of Philadelphia. And they've succeeded. The stagings and stories intertwined beautifully with the historic sites to create an fun, immersive, reiterated experience that "Brain Rules" author John Medina would approve of completely.

A real testament to the power of stories at work.

[P.S., The storytelling benches are open all summer till 4:30pm.]

Related post:
"Brain Rules" rules

Tags:
storytelling, history, narrative, travel

Waiting for the call to come in

A few weeks ago I was traveling in the northwest of England and I had an occasion to take a cab from my hotel to the office where I was working. The taxi driver who picked me up was very upset. He started cursing out the dispatcher and his terrible luck and I was ready for him to start cursing me out too. He tore through intersections in a futile effort to make up time. I was a bit shocked, but rather than engage with him, I just heard him out. "This is such a low F-ing fare and it's on an F-ing company account." And that he had to come from a long way to pick me up and that it was in the middle of F-ing rush hour. He saw the prospect of working for an hour just to make a few pounds and was very upset with that.

Eventually he calmed down. He began to talk about his life. He liked to work out. His girlfriend had just had an ectopic pregnancy and was recovering from surgery. At one point during the conversation he kind of took a breath and turned around to me and said: "You sit at your corner waiting for the call from the dispatch. You don't know when it's gonna come. You don't know how good the fare's gonna be. You don't know whether you're gonna make enough money that day to be able to support your family."

And he said, "You know, I'd really much rather have a proper job on an oil rig in the North Sea. That's something I hope to do some day."

It made me think of entrepreneurs. The taxi driver was one. He was waiting for the call to come in. That's the way he had to work. What a terrible feeling of powerlessness.

As I left the cab, I wished him good luck in finding his job. And he said, "Thanks mate." And drove off.

spoken through SpinVox

entrepreneurism, spoken post, narrative, travel

An important message about airport security

Here is an excellent post from the New York Times Jet Lagged blog. In it, Patrick Smith, a commercial pilot, systematically dissects the current state of airport security, arguing persuasively that nearly all the measures adopted to improve security are preventing old-style attacks or doing nothing useful at all.

Yet they cost millions of hours of time on behalf of passengers, and billions of dollars of extra personnel costs as well--helping to make air travel the misery it's become.

If you travel frequently by air, as I do, Smith's essay will ring true to you. Check it out.

travel

A Travel Power-Site You Should Know About

Serendipity is a beautiful thing. I was trying to book some travel for next week, and was having trouble finding a reasonable itinerary. Then I stumbled upon a podcast David Weinberger did with the founder of a travel site called kayak.com. David was very complimentary of the site, so I logged on.

And it's terrific. Kayak aggregates data from airline websites and other aggregators like Orbitz and Cheap Tickets, so it has the largest collection of airline reservation information I've seen in one place. Plus the user interface is very easy, fast to load, and allows for lots of filtering and "what ifs." Who would've thought there was more room for innovation in travel sites?

I've now said "bon voyage" to Orbitz. You may want to, as well.

travel business travel websites innovation