tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25220098.post6965980470654929846..comments2023-10-02T09:09:12.963-07:00Comments on NonprofitEye: DO I DARE DISTURB THE UNIVERSE?P. Ashlundhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08849994782572188510noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25220098.post-12598958994855905262006-11-18T06:19:00.000-08:002006-11-18T06:19:00.000-08:00Popularity versus quality: what is the relationshi...Popularity versus quality: what is the relationship? This issue makes me think of the situation of the Finnish government in the months preceeding the Winter War of 1939-1940.<br /><br />There was Gustaf Mannerheim, the savior of the country during the 1918 Civil War, being dismissed as a war- and fear-monger for his warnings that the country needed to prepare for the possiblity that the Russians--bargaining for some military consessions Stalin felt he needed to protect his "Nordic side door" from Hitler--might drop the negotiations and invade.<br /><br />Sure enough, while the great minds who marked the old man as a crank worked at negotiating in good faith with the agents of a man who would become one of the world's most infamous mass murderers, Stalin's troops were busy building secret invasion roads through the quiet pine woods.<br /><br />Then a half million Russians poured over the border in late November, and the country was so militarily ill-prepared that they were dragging Napoleonic-era cannons out of the parks so as to have something with which to fight back.<br /><br />Well, to whom did the visionaries in the government turn to save the nation? You guessed it: Mannerheim. And were it not for his military genius and the remarkable tenacity of the Finnish soldiers, the Finns would have lost their country. (This is the time about which Winston Churchill said, "Finland alone, in danger of death, shows what free men can do.")<br /><br />What's that got to do with the blog? Well, I'm an educator, and I see this problem all the time: the people who "rate" the quality of our ideas and give them thumbs-ups or downs are too often--the cynical would say "always"--swayed by popularity. They listen to the people they like, the people who tell them what they want to hear, the people who understand that, in the minds of our leaders, the only problems on the watch are the people who see any problems on the watch.<br /><br />So what makes a quality blog, a quality rating system, a quality anything? This is my thought: a friend of mine tells me there's a bar in New York whose walls are papered with the covers of all the number-one bestsellers for each week since the 1930's or some crazy thing. And he tells me that not one of those titles is recognizable today as a must-read in the field of literature.<br /><br />Maybe then, quality has nothing to do with popularity and everything to do with being correct, which, in many cases, only time proves.<br /><br />Thanks for the chance to comment, Cousin Pam!<br /><br />The HawkAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25220098.post-7518436860265581252006-11-16T17:38:00.000-08:002006-11-16T17:38:00.000-08:00My first comment from a real "content strategist"!...My first comment from a real "content strategist"! <br /><br />I love it Amy, you wrote a better summary of your blog in one sentence than I did in my whole posting. hahaha<br /><br />Thanks!P. Ashlundhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08849994782572188510noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25220098.post-48723225944064854422006-11-16T10:01:00.000-08:002006-11-16T10:01:00.000-08:00Hey, glad you liked my article.
You wrote: "Did I...Hey, glad you liked my article.<br /><br />You wrote: "Did I just use deconstructing and methodology in the same sentence?"<br /><br />Well, let me play editor:<br /><br />"Amy Gahran shot some major holes in how Technorati ranks blogs."<br /><br />...simple, active verbs almost always communicate better :-)<br /><br />- Amy Gahranagahranhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04596469492874664456noreply@blogger.com