Flow of Information

I woke up Monday morning and checked my email, twitter, and facebook as per usual. This morning however, I noticed a couple of odd comments on a friend's page. It seems others were wishing him to get better. I had just spoken to him the Saturday before so I found this terribly odd. Being the worrier I am, I kicked it in to high gear and put out a search. Contacted some mutual friends via phone and facebook. Much to my surprise, I found out more information, more quickly via facebook than by the old fashioned phone calls. An hour after finding out, I knew what hospital he was in and was able to call and speak to him. Of course this shocked him to no end and I'm sure now he thinks I'm a bit of a stalker but at least I could stop worrying. :)
What I'm most amazed at is how information travels now. Word of mouth is always going to be word of mouth but we have so many more options these days, especially with social networking. It's a quick burst of information that reaches a large audience in a minimal amount of time to any interested parties. It's a hell of a lot more efficient than calling everyone in someone's phonebook. No wonder marketing companies are chomping at the bit to get their clients to jump on the web 2.0 bandwagon. The internet used to be all about posting information. Now it's more about pulling and pushing that information around in a useful manner. Makes you wonder what's next.
So what's the moral of the story? I'm making sure I designate someone to post on my facebook and twitter pages if I'm ever in an accident.

Giving up on Windows and Switching to Ubuntu

Out of frustration with Windows and inability to purchase a Mac at this time, I installed Ubuntu this week. In my infinite wisdom, I didn't bother to defrag Windows, and I didn't give Ubuntu as much room as I should have. What have I done to myself? I found directions on how to do it (I think) but I'm being told that it's a bit of a pain to fix. Figures. I'm not sure I'll actually need more room but you never know.
Aside from that, I'm getting cozy in my little Ubuntu world and slowly getting things set up the way I want. Why didn't I switch sooner? With such viable options available these days, why is anyone still using Windows? Open office is a joy and open source software seems to have an answer for just about everything. My switch may be slow but I think I'll enjoy it. I haven't installed plone on Ubuntu yet but I'm excited to do so. I think it will be a fun new experience for me and hopefully go a lot smoother.