How did that happen, it seems only a matter of days ago that it was four weeks to go. Umm… yes… oh… I see…
Back to work then!
As a prototype for me being handed from person to person across a wide geographical area, I sent some moleskine notebooks out on a journey in the UK.
One came back today – it was supposed to go to Edinburgh before it was posted back to me.
JD Andrews was over in London in the Autumn last year and filmed this interview about Tuttle at the Centre for Creative Collaboration.
JD’s just announced that his channel @GoingSocialTV has been picked up by the R&R network – I’m hoping to catch up with JD at some point during March – likely at SXSWi but who knows where else? 🙂
Not me – other people, always other people…
It’s been interesting talking to people here (mostly those who aren’t active online social networkers) about the trip.
Firstly they perceive the risk of the trip as a whole to be much greater – it’s clear that those of us who live a lot of our lives online get that everything’s going to be alright. If you’re not used to it, it does seem a bit risky and scary.
But what else comes out, I think, is just a British fear of America. I’ve been variously told that I will end up being shot, chopped up in pieces in someone’s basement in Arkansas or wake up dressed in a gimp suit and ball gag and abused in unspeakable ways.
Thanks Hollywood!
Dunno, just grabbed me… thinking a lot at the moment about non-standard non-touristy views of London
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Dear American Friend
I’m writing to tell you about my forthcoming coast-to-coast trip which I’ll be making in March and to ask for your help and support. I’m calling it “Please Look After This Englishman” and it involves me traversing the real-world instantiation of my online social network, acquiring and telling stories as i go.
What I’m doing
I’m going to arrive somewhere on the West Coast on March 1st. The location isn’t decided yet but it will likely be somewhere where I have a relatively large group of friends and it needs to be somewhere that I can fly directly to from London. So San Francisco is looking a good bet although I’m still open to suggestions.
I then plan to attend SXSWi in Austin, TX from March 11th – 15th. This isn’t an absolutely must do, but it’s an important event for me to be at – it’s the chance I get each year to connect with far-flung bits of my online social network and it provides a stable midpoint for the trip.
From there, I intend to travel on and leave from the East Coast (probably Boston or NYC) on March 31st. I have a strong desire to revisit New Orleans and it would be great to be able to meet up with friends I made on last year’s trip in all the other cities we visited.
What I do between these beginning, middle and end “plot points” is rather up to you. Where I go, how I get there, what I do, who I meet, is all up for grabs although there are a few constraints. In particular it’s important to remember that:
I don’t drive
I won’t have pots of cash to throw at every problem
It’s more about having an adventure than about reaching a particular destination
I want to strike a balance between planning and spontanaiety.
Of course I’ll be writing, shooting video and photographs practically everywhere I go and using the blog and these other sites that bind us all together to let people see what’s going on, participate in decision-making and providing practical support. So for example, on March 1st, I could well be tweeting “Guys and gals, I need to be moving out of the city in an easterly direction, south-easterly would be best. Anyone able to help?” followed by “w00t! I got a lift as far as Vegas, anyone have a couch I can crash on tomorrow night?”
How you can be involved
Whatever you think you can do or would like to do, please get in touch and talk to me about it. I think involvement might come in the following flavours:
Spread the word – if you can do nothing else, *please* just tell some other people about this weird English guy, what he’s doing and where they can find me if they want to take part.
Just watching – gasping with amazement, pointing and laughing, making suggestions for next right steps – for now keep an eye on http://t2t2.posterous.com
Patronage & Sponsorship – I don’t want to throw money at this, but equally I don’t want to freeload the whole way – I also have expenses back in the UK to cover while I’m away. If people give me money or other help, I want to provide them with some value in exchange. This might range from me giving you the benefit of my brainpower and facilitation skills, through me entertaining and inspiring your staff with my tales from the road and a spot of ukulele fun, all the way to me wearing your logo on my t-shirt and evangelising your product wherever I go. However, if you’d like to make a donation to make sure that this thing can happen, because you just want more stuff like this in the world, that works for me too.
Lending a hand directly – I will need people to stay with, to drive me long distances, to feed me or at least eat with me, to show me around, to introduce me to interesting people and places, to smile at me and tell me I’m nuts but that’s OK and all manner of other things that I can’t imagine or am embarrassed (in my adorable, but infuriating, British way) to ask for.
My main job at the moment is getting sponsorship to help support me on the trip. This takes the form of cash, to make sure I’m not penniless when I enter the USA and can pay my bills while I’m away and products and services that will help me create an interesting experience for people following along online or off-.
I’m glad to say that the first partnership agreed is with Touchnote, who make and send cards for you based on your own photographs or designs (they also have ready-made designs).
Last year we sent cards from the road to people who’d sent us cash support (and I may well do that again) but it did take a while for me to remember to write them, go get stamps, find a mailbox, let alone wait while the US Postal Service and Royal Mail worked their magic.
So I’ll be sending one special card per day for the 30 days that I’m away – now all I’ve got to do is work out who to send them to… hmmm….
This is a difficult life lesson to learn. It’s so tempting to keep looking forward and plan and think a few moves deeper, trying to work out what the strategy should be and what other people should do, will do, might do in response to what you’re doing.
And yet in some (many?) (all?) circumstances all you have to do is what you need to do and you only really need to focus on the next right thing that needs to be done. You can only deliver the current step after all, but we can only ever live in the present and that doesn’t stop our minds racing off after all sorts. Just try three minutes meditation and see where your mind goes.
I found myself, and continue to do so, wondering what’s happening to the journals next. Trying to choose the best person to give them to, going over and over the instructions to think what might happen and even trying to work out what to do if something “goes wrong” – all pointless.
There’s another lesson in here about elaboration, which I’ll write about another time – but simply it’s making up that there must be something else to do, the desire to make something simple complex. I’ve seen this in other areas but in this project it’s come in the form of questions from participants: “Does it matter if…?” It’s really really hard to accept that the rules you’ve been given are the only rules there are – it’s enormously tempting to add new stuff in (and *whispers* actually that’s creativity in action!).
If you get a journal, try to remember that your job is simply to write in the book and pass it on to someone else who’s closer to the destination and maybe record the fact on twitter or in an e-mail to this blog. That’s all. No, really.
Perfect Path 