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Ideascaping the Long Tail for Mind-boggling Ideas

Passion lives with diversity on the long tail. Yep, it's an adventure going there. I discover awesome things - from niche markets - that blow me away and really cool people - bloggers - who have mind-boggling ideas about everything.

Everything is different. "Do they know each other?" I told her these people are smarter than you and me. There are so many of them. "How did you find this place?" One day I realized how ashamed of myself I was for not listening to the voice in my heart. I had become commoditized. I was not putting forth my real self. Day after day, week after week, I did the same dumb crap over and over again. Everywhere I looked, business, education, government, my community, they all looked the same.

No-thing mattered. The same people doing the same thing over and over and over... "kkk ...but how did you find this place, this world?" I don't know, but this feeling inside me created this overwhelming desire to stand up straight with my shoulders back and act like I had some damn sense in my head. Things started clicking, getting clear for me. I don't remember how I got here, but it feels right, the people care. They talk to me in my own voice.

From Baron Miguel Secluna's blog, "Your Intelligence, My Intelligence, Our Intelligence" by Mike Frascie. "For those of us in education and training, it is necessary to find ways to exploit the inexhaustible knowledge that exists at every level of every organization. It means that we can no longer look at learning in terms of a single person’s competencies. Diversity [the long tail] is the new mantra, particularly for higher education: diversity of products (the courses on the shelf), people, tools, offerings, bulletin board coverings, you name it. Diversity through shared knowledge recognizes that multiple intelligences can and do exist in organizations" [and outside them.]

You know, when I had ideas at work, I used to have to call my boss just to find out who to talk to about them - not any more.

Design and The Long Tail posted by Dominic Muren from IDFuel ..."for designers, the Long Tail may give new freedom where we were missing out before. ...The Tail is about creating pockets of absolutely devoted users in a sea of others who don't get it."

"That's what the Long Tail is really about: Freedom. Freedom from re-using tried and tired designs re-branded... Freedom from lowering your ideal to the lowest bidder's values. Freedom to design the things that you believe really matter. Because if they really matter to someone, the Tail connects them with it. Since you're free to do it, why not make some users passionate with your designs?"

From new and different ideas to exciting and unusual offerings, reaching the long tail is accessible to everyone that is tired of the same ol' same ol'. Pinch me, is this real?