For some reason I was inspired to read Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken” for the first time since high school, and I’ve been surprised in how my interpretation has changed over the years.

Previously I’d always seen the work as an ode to nonconformism, and doing things your own way. However today it struck me with a much different meaning, more aligned with thoughts of regret or opportunities lost.

This stems in no small part from the poem’s Wikipedia article, which among other things points out that I’ve always been wrong in calling it “The Road Less Traveled.” That ongoing oversight has significant implications when you think about it.

“The Road Less Traveled” implies the emphasis on the work is on the path he chose to take, whereas “The Road Not Taken” is far more concerned with what was passed up; the opportunity cost of taking “the one less traveled by,” you might say.

If you left the matter at that it could be a pretty depressing thought, really. What was once seen as an empowering statement about doing things differently is instead really about about what you’ve given up.

However the Wikipedia article goes on to cite an analysis that argues the work is more about indecisive dithering than a real loss of opportunity.

“Lawrance Thompson is cited as saying that the speaker of the poem is ‘one who habitually wastes energy in regretting any choice made: belatedly but wistfully he sighs over the attractive alternative rejected.’”

So perhaps the real message in the poem is to live in the present and not get caught up with excessive concerns about risk or reward, because the real joy is in the journey rather than the destination.

I hated to do it, but the spam was getting atrocious. Moments ago I configured the Discussion Settings in this blog to automatically close posts to commenting when more than 21 days old.

Like it or not, spam is a part of the Internet these days. Much like a digital arms race, the more effective that developers and programs become at identifying and preventing spam, the more insidious and inventive the spammers become at circumventing the protection measures.

Personally I’ve tried many different approaches over the last few years. From integrating different commenting systems, like Disqus, to authentication options like OpenID, or confirmation options like CAPTCHA, but I’ve never really been happy with any of them. Each tackled the spam problem somewhat, but almost inevitably introduced new problems of their own.

It was Lisa Lane’s point about most spam comments appearing on old posts that really made the decision. I have found this to be the case as well. Most frequently comments on recent posts are legitimate ones, but after a certain point, the vast majority are ones that don’t belong here.

She suggested using the auto-close option to try and mitigate the situation. This way, the most recent content remains open for discussion; but I’m spared the relentless stream of refuse beyond that. My hope is 3 weeks will be ample time for any discussion to occur on the posts that I’m writing. After that, commenting will need to take place as a blog track back.

I’m loathe to adopt this approach, because I like to eliminate barriers to conversation as much as possible, but ultimately enough was enough.

Open Horizons and Rough Seas

Once upon a time I was an avid blogger. Obsessive even.  I’d post about every plan I had, every nugget of thought, well considered, in-progress, or just passing anecdote.  I’d post in the future, present and past tense. I’d document everything.  I was an animal.

Then I got jaded and cynical.  Not about blogging per se, but about the field I was largely blogging about – education and educational technology.  Years spent in higher education had (and have) begun to wear on me.  My enthusiasm and passion waned, and I found I had nothing further to speak of; no drive to push the boundaries, or think outside the box.

To a fair degree this is unfortunately still the case.  My optimism for the future of education – and its ability to look ahead and evolve – is nothing like it used to be; it’s been irrevocably changed forever, and not in a good way.  Yet my interest in blogging hasn’t changed, it’s just been dormant.

I derive enormous benefits from the process of blogging.  I write to think and to discover; to learn, unlearn and relearn; to exercise my creative juices and to help me focus.  If I don’t write, I start to feel stale and uninspired.  I’ve been feeling stale and uninspired for quite some time now.

So I’m attempting to regain my blogging mojo.  Not to replicate what once was, but to let it evolve into something different.  This is why I’ve opted to start with a new domain, rather than my old one, TechTicker.  I still own the domain name, but the vision behind that project is no longer the vision I have now.

Coming Together, Moving Apart

Once upon a time I was passionate about social media for its own sake.  It was largely undiscovered at my institution, and my experiments were done after hours and purely for my own sake.  Then the idea of leveraging blogs, wikis and other “Web 2.0″ tools (the term still makes me shudder) became the flavour of the day and my professional and personal lives became enmeshed.

At first it was a fantastic thing.  I was able to spend most of the day every day in a sphere I truly enjoyed.  My existing knowledge proved to be tremendously valuable to my peers as well, which unfortunately started clouding my perception a bit via an inflating ego (justified or no).

Then things started going sour.  The inevitable clashes began between the organic, anarchic nature of social media and staid, arcane, conservative – boring – nature of academia.  Social media either became something to fear, to control, or to block out, or something that was of little interest because it was “too much work.”

So I threw the baby out with the bathwater and became a digital recluse.  By that point I’d become incapable of differentiating social media at work from social media outside of it, and the bad taste in my professional mouth permeated all aspects of participatory culture.  So I turned my back on it…for a while.

Planting My Flag

I’m now trying to break the two worlds up again now to retake my place in the digital realm; replanting my flag so to speak.  I choose to make this my space, and mine alone.  I choose not to define whether this is a professional blog, a personal blog.  Ultimately it’s neither and it’s both – but it’s all me.

My immediate personal goal for this space is to post at least once per week.  I truly hope I can rediscover the spark that drives me to contribute with zeal and passion, but I will be satisfied with small steps in the beginning.