The Memes of Production: A cultural studies weblog

A little spam attack (since fixed, I hope) brought the blog back to mind, and I realised that no one has posted for over a month (inexcusable!) In our defence, we’ve all been really busy…

I’m back studying full-time for three months, courtesy of a completion scholarship, and I hope to state posting parts of the thesis here, looking for comments and advice (which was part of the purpose for the blog in the first place), so watch this space. In the meantime, it seems I’ve found Lisa’s room of my own: I’ve got the run of the house, iTunes is on overload, and I can spread across the table (even if I do have to move everything back before I can start getting dinner on!)

But anyway, back to the problematics of a touristic construction of a temporary and contingent community…

OK, it has been quite a while since “Memes” has had a substantive posting. There is a reason for this: Pownce, j’accuse!

The main contributers to “Memes,” as well as many of its most frequent commenters, have found ourselves enjoying the ease of communicating within a semi-private forum, based on shared values, ideas, and experiences. It seems easier to throw an observation or insight into a known space, than into the dark where who-knows-who will pick it up (“Memes” has been mercifully free of flames, but it is curious to see who will sometimes drop by with an objection). Exchanges have also been more casual and funny than you would expect on a blog (well, our sort of blog), as is natural to this sort medium.

Sometime colleague, blogger, and Pownce-buddy Catherine offers some insights into the Pownce interface. She’s right: there are still problems with the interface, particularly the thread handling capabilities, but the developers are working on it, and as a group, we are starting to develop our own conventions. The publicity talks about Pownce as the “Twitter Killer”, or as the IM that lets you send files. Many of the people in our little Pownce group have used it for purposes across this range, but on the whole, we tend more to the threaded discussion-cum-IM capabilities, and I for one can’t see Twitter going anywhere very soon.

So, as an experiment in IM on steroids, I’m finding Pownce flawed, but valuable. I just wish that I could have shared some of the discussions on “Memes”: makes of car named after mythological figures was a particular highlight!

Anyway, expect some real content here soon: I promise!

I’ve been meaning to do this for a while, and finally found the time. I have edited the blogroll, removing some no-longer-active links, and adding some notable citizens of the blogsphere, as well as some old friends (hi Tseen, Sam).

If there is anyone I have missed, let us know…

Welcome to Blown Glass which now appears on our blog roll.

Clif has done some great work in relation to surfing, masculinity and identity, and his blog provides interesting insights in these topics and their relation to cultural studies. Check him out…

Thanks for the suggestions—we’ll be adding additional links to our blog roll in the coming days.

Maybe there’s some weird caching issue.

I updated the previous post with the following useful info, but that hasn’t updated the RSS feed in Bloglines or in Feedburner.

I should be a bit more specific. If you are reading The Memes of Production through a newsreader application or website such as Bloglines, please do update your feed url to this address: http://feeds.feedburner.com/TheMemesOfProduction

According to Russell Beattie, there are some weird problems with interactions between the two services.

Yes, meta-blogging really is the worst kind of blogging. Sorry! I have a post taking shape on celebrity, post-scarcity science fiction, and the limitations of the utopian imagination. So stay tuned.

In the world’s most pointless blog post, I’m testing the new feedburner RSS feeds on the site.

Update

I should be a bit more specific. If you are reading The Memes of Production through a newsreader application or website such as Bloglines, please do update your feed url to this address: http://feeds.feedburner.com/TheMemesOfProduction

In which our hero, Nick, cautiously invites you to examine our wares.

Welcome to the soft launch of The Memes of Production, a joint-authored weblog that looks at the world from a cultural studies perspective.