Again with the Monty Python, but this clip illustrates the following post as well as it did the post about my flesh wound:

Brian Ward disappeared from Facebook the other day, while we were in the middle of a debate. I was surprised by this, because Brian runs a great-value blog, a lot of which is dedicated to holding other citizen journalists to account. I’m bothering to post about it because I feel like it’s necessary to return the service.

Brian posted a link to an article about the new batch of deadly drugs going around at the moment, accompanied by a comment that people deserved what they got if they took dubious drugs from a dubious dealer. I would post the exact link and comment, but of course I no longer have access to Brian’s Facebook wall.

I said the comment was inordinately harsh, that some people might not be in a position to make a better decision and should not be judged so fiercely for making a bad judgement call. Someone else got involved and the debate quickly swung away from the initial issue to focus on the morality of dealing, something I feel entirely differently about: dealing dubious drugs is morally reprehensible; consuming them is not – and is certainly not deserving of the scorn demonstrated in Brian’s dismissive comment.

It’s exactly this sort of narrow-mindedness that causes problems in drug culture: people who are ignorant of the complexities involved in the decisions surrounding drugs make generalisations that tar the whole community with the wrong brush. Drug users are not all reckless and irresponsible – many use them safely, and I consider it a shame that such users bear the brunt of the stigma that results from those who are irresponsible, and from those who shame them.

Of course, I never got as far as explaining this to Brian. When I came back to the debate and couldn’t access his page, I thought maybe an error had occurred. I added him again, but my advances were rejected. I tried again the next morning. Then and now, when I search for his name he no longer comes up in the results.

At first I thought Brian had a massive dummy spit because I didn’t agree with him¹, but as I’ve gone about drafting the post I’ve realised I should give him the benefit of the doubt, as his Facebook page appears to no longer exist. Maybe something really has gone wrong: I’ve emailed him to find out, but have not heard back.

Of course it’s entirely up to Brian whether he allows me to see his Facebook page, and the truth is that we’re not exactly ‘friends’ – we have met once, through a mutual friend. But I had assumed Brian was reading the Facebook definition of ‘friend’ rather loosely – he did, after all, either extend a friendship request to me, or accept one from me, I can’t remember which now.

Maybe I was wrong in assuming that Brian was using Facebook for reasons other than to keep in touch with friends – I have seen him chime in on debates elsewhere, so I thought it would have extended to Facebook. Plus, that he published such a provocative and opinion-laden link suggests that he uses Facebook for debate and information extending beyond his immediate friend circles.

Brian, if something really has gone wrong with Facebook and you’d like to rejoin the debate here, I would certainly welcome that.

1. from what I’ve read on his blog, he doesn’t take criticism well

I just found these two grouse websites, Brazen Careerist and Location Independent Professionals. I’ve been thinking of mobilising Paine Management for some time, and it’s been great to bump into a bunch of like-minded souls: people who want to be financially (and locationally?) independent. Each of them have great blogs – in fact, Brazen Careerist has many, somehow linked to members’ sites.

I even found a post called ‘Putting Together A Portable Office That You Can Take With You Anywhere You Go In The World’.

The first time I thought of myself as the sort of guy who might use a portable office was when I was interviewed by David Prater for Cordite. He described the man bag I carried at the time as a ‘portmanteau’. I’m pretty sure Orwell’s listless Gordon uses a ‘portmanteau’ in Keep the Aspidistra Flying as well.

What I’m talking about is not a ‘portmanteau’. It’s just a portable office. I always thought ‘portmanteau’ meant, specifically, ‘portable office’. It doesn’t.

But the thing with Gordon would be the second time I bumped into the notion.

It’s difficult to articulate how excited it makes me when I discover  whole groups of disparate people doing similar things with their life that I’d like to do. When it gets as specific as building a portable office, it gets kind of boggling.

Combine all this with my principle of Three Degrees of Uncoordination and a decision pops out: I’m going to create a portable office. If I do, I might need to do what this guy (presumably) did, and ditch all my stuff. Getting rid of my books is proving to require a few more than three collisions of colluding ideas, however.

I had started creating something other than a portmanteau before I found these websites, and I had begun to break it down into items I would be able to transport with me, and items I would need to buy at each location. Ideally I could have a bike wherever I go, but transporting one each time I move is simply impracticle, so that’s an item I’d need to have in my ‘Purchase Onsite’ category. Bike pants, on the other hand, would go in the ‘Transport’ category, of course.

I bought a mini stapler today, to replace my clunker, which had run out of staples anyway.

Now I will never be late again!

I’m excited about Brazen Careerist because, as a testimonial run from FastCompany said, they ‘decided to turn existing traditional online career management tools on their ear’ by merging the best of Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn, in a way that might practically advance your career. Basically it seems like a fun version of LinkedIn, which is a weird schmoozy site of the most boring variety, until you have hundreds in your network, which is not where you’re going to be if you’re interested in things like Brazen Careerist. A good stopgap, then, between Facebook and Linked in, via Twitter.

As you read and write around the site, your updates and comments are published in your personal feed, which is called Ideas. In the tab next to that you have your resume, so that if people like what you’re thinking, they might check out your resume to see if you’re good for a job they know about, or an opportunity coming up. That’s how I imagine the site to work, anyway – I’m still new to it.

I never cease to be amazed by what I find on the internet created by like-minded young people.

I’ve set up my profile on Brazen Careerist¹ and joined the Ning group for Location Independent Professionals, the Clubhouse. If you’re in Melbourne and this sounds like your sort of thing, it’d be great to see you there because I feel like the real value of these new mediums is found when they intersect somewhat with your physical world.

1. which, although it’s irrelevant, my fingers insist on typing as Brazeen Carerist – watch out for that one!