I recently read The Puppet Masters by Robert A. Heinlein – in fact, it was the first thing by Heinlein that I've ever read in my life.
I have a complicated relationship with science fiction. I wouldn't count any science fiction writer among my top five favorite authors, but there are two of them in my top ten – Isaac Asimov and Kim Stanley Robinson. Some would argue whether Kim Stanley Robinson really is a sci-fi writer, but he's close enough that he isn't “not” one.
Even though I love Asimov's stuff, it's not so much because he was a great writer as because he was a great storyteller. He was a good enough writer, and smart enough to know what his readers would buy into and what they wouldn't. I'll take a good story over good writing any day, although the best fiction writers, obviously, do both well.
Kim Stanley Robinson's a pretty good storyteller too and, although he's not nearly as prolific as Asimov was (who is?), I think he's a much better writer.
My general beef with science fiction and fantasy is that so very often they present a scenario that I can't imagine could reasonably take place. I like Asimov because his stories, although generally set far in the future, are conceivable.
The Puppet Masters is conceivable too. It's hokey in some ways, having been written almost 60 years ago. His depictions of women are pretty outdated, even though he seems to have anticipated the sexual revolution on some level. By never anticipating the modern feminist movement as it eventually took shape, he seems to have gone straight to the so-called post-feminist woman in one of his protagonists. But the story itself reads like a detective thriller, and thrillers are always fun to read.
You won't find a whole lot of symbolism in this book, unless you equate the alien antagonists with Stalinism. Something slimy has come to Earth, apparently from Titan, and is taking over people's bodies and minds by attaching to their backs.
The main characters all work for a super-secret spy service that is charged with finding ways to save the world, so to speak, from its ameba-like invaders.
What I found interesting beyond the basic plot was the ideas about society that Heinlein presented way back in 1951 or so. As I mentioned, he had some ideas about the role of women in a future world that someone like Asimov wasn't ready to embrace at that time. His depictions of sexual relationships are a hybrid of 1950's idealized romance and late-70's uber-freedom. To call him a visionary would be giving him too much credit, but he certainly saw society moving in a specific direction and anticipated in some ways how that might play out.
After I started thinking about some of this I happened to look up Heinlein on Wikipedia and found that he was a bit of a folk hero to the 1960's counter-culture. Apparently Stranger in a Strange Land was particularly influential. I'll have to hunt down a copy and read it for myself.
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Getting on Board
Like many large organizations, government bureaucracies can be slow to adopt new ideas. The Government of Canada is not immune to this phenomenon.
A couple of weeks ago I attended a panel discussion on social media in Government of Canada communications. The panel comprised a policy expert who is working on developing guidelines for official use of social media, a member of the Health Canada communications shop, which was a (relatively) early adopter of social media, a representative from the office of Canada's Privacy Commissioner, and two people who discussed the official languages implications of using social media in Government of Canada communications.
The language thing is an important consideration in our work, because Canada is officially bilingual, meaning that all government communications must occur simultaneously in both English and French. This makes real-time conversations on the Internet problematic, to say the least. We can get around it by responding to individual messages in the chosen language of the correspondent, but we have to Tweet in both languages, we have to respond to blog comments in both languages, and we have to make Youtube videos in both languages.
I would love to see how a country like Switzerland, which has four official languages, handles its official communications (or India, which has hundreds of languages and dialects). Doing everything in two languages is a challenge, but the contributions that both of Canada's founding cultures have made to this country outweigh the difficulties of communicating with all our citizens in their own language.
But despite the hurdles to doing social media well, there is broad recognition now that we have to do it. Our mandate as communicators is to reach Canadians in the media they're using to get their information. Twenty years ago TV spots, news releases, brochures, and newspaper ads were enough. Ten years ago adding a static web page was good enough. Now our web presence requires us to be interactive and responsive, because Canadians expect it of us. Canada has one of the highest rates of Internet use in the world. Its government has to keep pace or people will stop turning to us for information.
Fortunately, a few departments have caught onto the possibilities of social media and they are acting as a beacon for others. One of them is Health Canada. A previous Health Minister has for years been a strong advocate for Web 2.0 technology and was very supportive of efforts to improve the department's web presence. The Health Canada web specialist who addressed the panel advised those just getting into social media to follow the crawl-walk-run-fly model. Start by analyzing the public environment and seeing what others are saying about you. Next, start using social media channels to get out the messages we are already spreading by traditional channels. Thirdly, start soliciting feedback and holding two-way conversations with the public. The last stage (flying) involves using inbound marketing tactics such as putting your message out on public forums like message boards and other places where people gather to talk about your portfolio to offer advice, correct misinformation and generally add value to online conversations.
During the question and answer session, someone asked if there had been any major screw-ups committed by government employees using social media for official communications, and the answer was no. This was no surprise to me, since Government of Canada communications specialists are among the most dedicated and competent communicators you'll find anywhere.
All in all, the discussion was encouraging. There are a lot of people chomping at the bit to get behind social media communications, and the movers and shakers are starting to take notice. Ultimately, it will be a part of every communicator's job description and those who learn all they can about it now will have a definite advantage.
A couple of weeks ago I attended a panel discussion on social media in Government of Canada communications. The panel comprised a policy expert who is working on developing guidelines for official use of social media, a member of the Health Canada communications shop, which was a (relatively) early adopter of social media, a representative from the office of Canada's Privacy Commissioner, and two people who discussed the official languages implications of using social media in Government of Canada communications.
The language thing is an important consideration in our work, because Canada is officially bilingual, meaning that all government communications must occur simultaneously in both English and French. This makes real-time conversations on the Internet problematic, to say the least. We can get around it by responding to individual messages in the chosen language of the correspondent, but we have to Tweet in both languages, we have to respond to blog comments in both languages, and we have to make Youtube videos in both languages.
I would love to see how a country like Switzerland, which has four official languages, handles its official communications (or India, which has hundreds of languages and dialects). Doing everything in two languages is a challenge, but the contributions that both of Canada's founding cultures have made to this country outweigh the difficulties of communicating with all our citizens in their own language.
But despite the hurdles to doing social media well, there is broad recognition now that we have to do it. Our mandate as communicators is to reach Canadians in the media they're using to get their information. Twenty years ago TV spots, news releases, brochures, and newspaper ads were enough. Ten years ago adding a static web page was good enough. Now our web presence requires us to be interactive and responsive, because Canadians expect it of us. Canada has one of the highest rates of Internet use in the world. Its government has to keep pace or people will stop turning to us for information.
Fortunately, a few departments have caught onto the possibilities of social media and they are acting as a beacon for others. One of them is Health Canada. A previous Health Minister has for years been a strong advocate for Web 2.0 technology and was very supportive of efforts to improve the department's web presence. The Health Canada web specialist who addressed the panel advised those just getting into social media to follow the crawl-walk-run-fly model. Start by analyzing the public environment and seeing what others are saying about you. Next, start using social media channels to get out the messages we are already spreading by traditional channels. Thirdly, start soliciting feedback and holding two-way conversations with the public. The last stage (flying) involves using inbound marketing tactics such as putting your message out on public forums like message boards and other places where people gather to talk about your portfolio to offer advice, correct misinformation and generally add value to online conversations.
During the question and answer session, someone asked if there had been any major screw-ups committed by government employees using social media for official communications, and the answer was no. This was no surprise to me, since Government of Canada communications specialists are among the most dedicated and competent communicators you'll find anywhere.
All in all, the discussion was encouraging. There are a lot of people chomping at the bit to get behind social media communications, and the movers and shakers are starting to take notice. Ultimately, it will be a part of every communicator's job description and those who learn all they can about it now will have a definite advantage.
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