Gadgetopia

I’ve read two things on blogs lately that I find very cool. These are two situations in which blogs were used to connect people, and to do things that matter outside of this little, fake world we bloggers have created for ourselves.

• 4 Generations
  Blogger A writes about how a friend “received” a water buffalo for Christmas. Actually her Dad “donated” a water buffalo to a Chinese family in her name by giving $250 to a charity. However, in the fine print, it turned out there was no actual water buffalo, it was just figurative.

  Blogger B reads this, and he happens to live in China. So he comments on Blogger A’s post and says for the same donation he will buy an actual water buffalo, take it into the country, and donate it to an actual Chinese family.

  Donations are gathered, and Blogger B goes out and does just what he said he would. Better yet, he films it. It’s about 10 minutes that will make you happy to be alive.

• The Astoria Notes
  A blogger decides to post a series of letters he received under his door from his downstairs neighbor named Sophina years ago. It sounds like she was a little crazy, and she would send him these odd, rambling diatribes about how much noise he was making. He kept them all these years, photographed them, and posted them to his blog. It’s a pretty funny read.

  A few days later, he’s contacted by a teacher in Florida who teaches English to kids “who really struggle with reading.” He asks if he can turn the blog posting into a reading assignment for his students, since he thinks they’d be interested in the subject. Permission is granted, and the teacher gives the kids an assignment to read the letters, then write theoretical letters of response to Sophina.

  They do, and the teacher gets the kids to read them, and posts the audio.

Fundamentally, I believe blogging is about connecting with people, which is what separates it from mainstream news reporting. Consequently, I love both of these stories.

If you have or have heard other stories like this, I’d love to hear about them.