sharing | SEBA DIZAJN

One week ago the container vessel MV Rena ran aground off the east coast of New Zealand’s north island, she is stranded on the Astro Reef near Tauranga. At that stage the weather was clear and calm;

From what I understand a lot of valuable potential clean up time was lost while the weather was calm.

I am a New Zealander based in Croatia, on the radio here I was able to pick out something about environmental ‘catasphoe’ in NZ, and I have been watching, reading and learning about this VAST and tragic disaster since I first heard this news. Anxious to know what is not being reported in the ‘news’ I asked a Tauranga based friend what she knew, through this friend I was put in touch with a the ‘MV Rena Response Monitoring & Action’ Group that has been established on facebook.

The images that I am using here come via this group and I am following with interest, sadness and awe the ‘progress’ on cleaning up the mess that has been created by the grounding of this huge vessel. The ship was carrying 1,368 containers, eight of which contained hazardous materials, as well as 1,700 tons of heavy fuel oil and 200 tons of marine diesel.

By Sunday, 9 October, a 5-kilometre (3.1 mi) oil slick threatened wild life and the area’s rich fishing waters.Oil from the Rena began washing ashore at Mt Maunganui beach on 10 October 2011. Bad weather that night caused the ship to shift on the reef, and the crew were evacuated. The shifting of the ship caused a further damage, resulting in a further 130 – 350 tonnes of oil leaking. (via Wikipedia)

My interest in this disaster is natural as a New Zealander/caring environmental person, my sadness is also a natural reaction to this disaster;

how can we not feel saddened?

And my awe stems from the strength of passion and the sharing and caring expressed by the members of MV Rena Group – together we are strong. The information, updates, video footage, photographs and thoughts that are being shared via this forum remind me how great it is to be a New Zealander, how together we achieve more, how in times of trouble we must pull together and how the combined voices of people who care need to shared and listened to. Will our government listen? What action will be taken and will lessons be learnt from this environmental catastrophe?

As I am writing this it is about 3am in New Zealand and these words were just shared to the group by someone who had stopped her car at the beach on her way home from work,

‘ there was a airy feeling standin there alone it felt like i have just lost a love one i know i have we all have it our beach our pride and joy. as i walked bck to my car tears rolled down my check as it was like i was saying goodbye. i dont know what i was feeling maybe it was sadness anger all in 1 i have no idea’

this was one of the first images that I saw, it also resonated very strongly with me.

Thanks to group members for allowing me to share your photos, and for all the work that you are doing, sharing and caring, you make me proud to be a New Zealander amid this mess. Kia kaha!

http://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/5770592/Rena-disaster-Second-officer-charged-cracks-in-ship

A news article and footage of the MV Rena

http://www.petitiononline.co.nz/petition/demand-answers-from-the-national-led-nz-government-regarding-the-rena-oil-spill/1338#.TpVrVmCTiTM.facebook

This link will lead you to an on-line petition to be presented to the NZ government when it has 50,000 signatures.

Today I am delighted to introduce you to Michele Taylor, www.micheletaylorcoach.me.uk

This has been social media summer for me: rather than soaking up the sun, frolicking in the waves and dancing the sultry nights away with an eye to where the next Mojito is coming from, I’ve been soaking up the tweets, floundering in Facebook and blogging the grey days away, with an eye to my Search Engine Optimisation.

It’s been a steep learning curve – and an exciting one. I would never have believed I’d get so excited about being e-mailed with notice of a re-tweet, or get such a kick from a comment on the blog. It’s become all about the visibility, the reach, the influence, the followers…

I have to confess to getting quite hard-nosed and outcome-driven about it all. But I was stopped short when
talking to my highly valued friend and coaching colleague, Elaine Burke (find her at http://www.linkedin.com/in/elaineburke). Elaine started to talk about generosity and the importance of being generous with your materials and your knowledge. I immediately jumped in with, “oh, yes, of course, as a loss-leader” thinking in terms of growing a following and a market by getting your materials known. “No,” said Elaine, “I meant just being generous for its
own sake.”

I felt abashed and yet also excited. Connections started to be made in my mind, dominoes started to fall and cogwheels turn as I thought of all the material I had looked at in the last few weeks: words, diagrams, videos, ideas, reviews and tools that others had been generous enough to share with their online communities.

Links emerged for me between this generosity, so apparent within social media, and the idea of each of us as a curator of our own creative worlds. With iPods, we know longer rely on someone deciding on which music goes with which other music: we decide, we curate our own musical space. Then we share it for others to enjoy and adapt and make their own. With Flickr and InstaGram, we are all capable of curating and sharing an exhibition of our lives and passions for others to view, pass on and critique; we curate our own aesthetic space.

And with social media, and its inherent democratisation of so much knowledge, we can each curate our own libraries of information, picking what is relevant, and organising it in such a way as to make sense within our own unique workflow and social patterns.

This must influence us as artists and makers, as we look for inspiration within our social media communities as well as within our physical and inner worlds. How exciting to see others curate our work, incorporating it into their own lives and spaces.

Thanks to Elaine, I will seek to practise generosity for its own sake in my social media dealings – just as I take for granted that I can benefit from the generosity of others – and I will look with curiosity to see whether and how others curate my ideas into their worlds.

I know Michele would appreciate your feedback on her post, please leave your comments below.

You can read more from Michele on her own blog, here is a link to one of her recent posts, http://micheletaylorcoach.wordpress.com/2011/08/24/5-top-tips-for-using-goals-to-get-things-done/ – 5 TOP TIPS for Using Goals to Get Things Done. You can also find Michele on facebook, https://www.facebook.com/micheletaylorcoachandtrainer –