This is a guest post by my friend Marrus, a New Orleans based artist who recently published her first book, Lightsurfing. I’ve watched her grow in her use of social media over the past several years and thought this piece of hers would be fantastic reading for our audience here on SocialGumbo.  So here you go, something to ponder about the state of the English language and communications. If you enjoy it go pay her a visit at marrusart.com! -Loki

Something whack has been happening when I speak. And a similar whackitude is happening when I write.

I’ve always had this thing about wanting to be absolutely, clearly understood. (And yes, I know it’s impossible). With the preponderance of written correspondence, I’ve found that I’m peppering my missives with more and more emoticons and acronyms. That “WTF” has become spoken, rather than just written. That my few remaining Luddite friends stare blankly when I interject LOL-speak into a conversation. “ROFLCOPTERED” has become a word. Gah.

And emoticons. I’m just as likely to end a typed sentence in “O_o” or “;)” as I am a period or exclamation point. I hate the chilliness of the black word on white screen, and I will sink to these minimalist cartoons to inject personality into my intent. I know I’m not alone in this, and I’m wondering if this is good or bad for the language.

I know that English is an malleable, morphing, inclusive, vibrant, twisty, sculptural, mercurial, absorptive whore. I think that’s a good thing. But I’m watching a dividing line growing between those who are tech-savvy and those who are not. An impatience with reading more than three paragraphs, or, jeebus forefend, 140 characters on one side. On the other, an insistent ignorance of how net language is changing the way we think, speak, act. Maybe all in keeping with the way English grows & changes anyway. Perhaps the flood of new words and punctuation adds to its structure, and makes us think & inter-relate in new ways.

But I know I’m guilty of dismissing someone who types in all caps as an idiot. (I’ve actively heard the imaginary yelling.) I suspect I’m not alone. If someone doesn’t know what a LOLcat is – are you done with her? Someone else isn’t good at checking email – is your friendship over? An old friend doesn’t bother with MyFaceJournal. Do you not bother with him anymore? Is the separation between net & not-net savvy the new cultural divide?

The way I have conversations has changed. I spoke to my mother a while back and she asked how I was doing. I barely began to respond when she cut me off: “I already read that on your blog.” I have strangers bring up things I wrote about five years before, launching into an unremembered conversation I forgot I started. I’m falling out of touch with beloved friends because they aren’t online. I’m getting frustrated with having to repeat in person what I got tired of typing about six months earlier.

It’s like living on multiple meta-levels. I can’t keep track of which conversations I have with whom, where. Don’t know if I know someone online or in person. Don’t know how to set my face when I’m working a show, cuz someone comes up to me grinning like we’re best friends, and I don’t know who they are til they give me their screen name. It’s insane.

(Yeah, I know I’m all over the place again. Time to spend more time on my bike & in the studio than at the computer.)

-Marrus

One of the first voices I ran across when I started to test drive Twitter was Ari Herzog. He was all over the place it seemed. I had already been familiar with some of his work on Mashable and the Huffington Post, and found his thoughts on transparency to quite interesting.

At that time the Presidential election was looming and every Internet channel imaginable was humming like a Tuvan throat singer. Twitter’s infamous Fail Whale was sighted frequently and links, snark, and political data were inescapable.

As the Obama campaign showed us, the Internet has now had a direct and massive impact on our nation’s political process. Ari has been staying at the forefront of the intersection between social media and government, or Gov 2.0 for some time now. Recently he kindly agreed to share his views and knowledge (and a great cookie recipe) with us in the following interview (conducted via email).

In His Words: Ari Herzog is the principal of Ari Herzog & Associates, providing online media strategies for business and government. Leveraging 10 years of experience in information technology, community journalism, and government administration, Ari uses a holistic approach to explain why it is important to embrace the social web, focusing on different, customized approaches for every client. For instance, every company does not need to blog and every PR firm does not need to tweet. By the same token, every company needs to blog and every PR firm needs to tweet. Confused yet? Ari can help you cut through the Web 2.0 clutter.

The author of AriWriter, where he provides strategies and tips on social media and online marketing, Ari is also a guest writer at the Huffington Post and Mashable. He created the Twitter Fan Wiki for U.S. Government in August 2008; and recently started working part-time for Social Media Today responsible for blogger recruitment, front-end programming, and management for the Sustainable Cities Collective and Governing People online communities. You can follow him on Twitter, FriendFeed, GovLoop, and a host of other social networking sites.

Loki: Since Gov 2.0 is your focus would you share your perspective on extreme transparency as applied in a governmental setting? How important is total transparency as a goal? What do you see as the largest obstacles to implementing it?

Ari Herzog: If you rewind time to January 20, 2009, the first White House blog post was written by new media director Macon Phillips, where he expressed President Barack Obama’s commitment to the tenets of communication, transparency, and participation. Macon wrote, “WhiteHouse.gov is just the beginning of the new administration’s efforts to expand and deepen this online engagement.” Recalling Obama’s campaign platform, one of the items he planned to initiate was the ability to enable citizens to read, review, and offer feedback on non-emergency legislation. Three months later, that has yet to occur, despite many bills across the Oval Office desk. From my perspective, there are three major obstacles:

1. outdated infrastructure, e.g. the White House received legal approval to use GMail email addresses in lieu of official dot-gov accounts.
2. outdated or nonexistent policies, e.g. the Department of Defense has no policy on social technologies, despite military branches and Pentagon agencies using such tools.
3. lack of streamlining across government agencies, e.g. some departments are blocking access to Twitter while others allow it; or some departments use Google Analytics to track web statistics, while others use WebTrends.

The case study I frequently cite is South Korea, where 11,000 emails are sent annually to the mayor of Seoul and he personally replies to each one. The city also offers free internet training classes to improve citizen participation; and provides online learning through podcasts and video-on-demand. Government meetings are streamlined online and across TV, and citizens can interact in real-time. Should I add that every Seoul citizen can pay taxes online, and their e-taxes are stored on government servers for five years?

How about Singapore, where an internet system called SingPass enables every citizen over age 15 to use one username and one password to access 50 government services?

For a U.S. example, you may enjoy reading an interview with Dave Fletcher, the Chief Technology Officer for the state of Utah. Among the state’s best practices are 800+ online services, a 24×7 chat session, and blogging employees. Last fall, Utah became the first state in the country to close Fridays, due to the online engagement.

Loki: Would you tell our readers a bit about the Twitter Fan Wiki of U.S. Government that you started last August, and any subsequent projects that have grown out of it? What other resources of a similar nature would you advise for those interseted in Gov2.0?