Cartoon Characters?

First there was Maha going on about 3D or F2F

F2F , as I understood it, can be via Skype or a Hangout.

3D is when we are together in a physical space.

Then there was Tania suggesting in a tweet that tweeps such as @Bali_Maha, @dogtrax, @sensor63  et al in her PLN were 'cartoon characters' - if she had not met them F2F or should I say 3D?

So is that my friends what we are to one another - Cartoons - (on)line drawings?

Like a canary to a black and white cat that was a red rag to a bull.

Existential questions

1) Are our online 'friends', 'follows' 'followers', akin to Loony Tunes?
2) Are our offline 'friends', 'follows', 'followers' not akin to Loony Tunes?

Cartoon preamble.

I can quite accept that @dogtrax or should I say Mr Hodgson K. qualifies as an honorary cartoon character.

His lifetime achievement to cartooning in itself would merit such an accolade.

I am not sure that I am quite yet ready to take on the caricature mantle without a fight.

Round one.

The strange case of Culture Club.

I can boast quite openly that I once met Boy George F2F (3D) outside the Mud Club in central London, while driving a London cab.

To be accurate, I was parked (as in stationary) in front of the Mud Club.

Boy George was undoubtedly a larger than life character, dressed to the nines, painted in broad strokes, armed with an infectious laugh.

He was surrounded by acolytes, disciples, hangers-on, groupies, and various fawning clubbers, similarly attired.

They appeared to be infected with George's laugh.

"Ho ho ho ho." (George)

Micro-second later

"He he he he." (Queen's court)

I am quite sure the boy George had more depth than this vignette.  There was no apparent desire among the performers to go beyond the make-up.

So, I would say Tania that being a cartoon character is not exclusive to online avatars.

Round two.

The strange case of the decoy learner.

I had the strange impression that at one time in my life, I was perfoming in a pantomime that was recognisably school.

I was the teacher operating the Cambridge text-book franchise.

The students were the masked chorus who followed the lesson plan scenario to the letter (3D p45).

The routines were will-drilled, will-oiled, caricatures of learning.

We might have been in a physical space but I couldn't suggest that it was 3D learning.

It might even have been hard to describe it as F2F learning.

It was rather a flat representation of learning.

If an inspector had spied activity in the room, he might have thought,

"Aha those must be learners."

rather like the Germans did during the war when they were conned by the allies brilliantly imagined inflatable tanks.

Ah ha A tank. Donner und Blitzen. A flying tank.

Yep Tania, cartoon learning.

Round three

The strange case of the feral chicken.

I confess that I have never met Maha, Terry, Keith, Clarissa 3D.

I have however met them F2F in hangouts.  I would suggest that the time that we spent before online blogging, tweeting, commenting, et al has enabled a depth of connection which is far superior to that that I 'enjoy' with many of the colleagues that I have 'known' 3D over a number of years.

Many of the my 3D colleagues are unknown to me, they remain line-drawings.

I have a better impression of my PLN's life thanks to meeting up in hangouts, thanks to an authenticity of exchange, thanks to a shared language which goes beyond our differences.

Avatars, text, zeegas are accompanied by memories of Cairo traffic sounds,  Kentucky roosters, Florida coffee, Brazilian t-shirts, stories of feral chicken.

No cartoons there.

Round four

The strange case of the sensor63 blogger

I sometimes feel that a distinct voice, that is evidenced in this Touches of Sense blog, has become a distinct character.

There are times when I feel distanced from it's mannerisms, its annoying ways with words.

There are times when I feel that I shall introduce a new character to stem its irritating flow.

CARTOON character.

OMG identity breakdown.

I am reminded of Maha's reflections on how she feels at times as catalogued as an 'exotic'.

I am reminded of Susan's reflections on her various incarnations.

I wonder if despite ourselves we become characters in others' performances.

We take up our roles like tin soldiers, like Winnie the Pooh, Piglet, Eeyore, Tom and Jerry in a 2D world of intersecting comics.

CARTOON character.

I throw in the towel.

OK Tania, I accept defeat. I am a caricature.

I am happy to be added to your online bestiary of amusing roustabouts.

This comic metaphor has become too complex for the cartoon @sensor63.

He accepts the mask.

He is one of the Connected Comic Characters.

He must live with it.

Oh the tragedy!

We are confetti...

"Silence is the language of god, all else is poor translation." 
Rothfuss. P.

At this instant, patchwork patterns are being sewn, kaleidoscope paths plotted, complex algo-rhythms are being played out.

Perception.
This is another territory on a map.

What do you see?

A triumph, a carnival, a wedding, a party....?

In my eyes, from my vantage-point, these giffed fragments floating through this page are you my friends, your words, your images, this artefact.

This is another of our coded lines of flight.

Forgive me for not naming you particle by particle.
You are yourselves unwittingly multi-colouring these volatile pieces, right now, as I speak.

What do you hear?

A terrifying explosion? Church bells? A marching band? Hearts beating...?

Hanging on for dear life.
I am constantly retracing those steps, looking at new landscapes from different perspectives, attempting to give myself meaning, to understand intention in these acts. I sort, I trace, I gather stuff, I converse with passersby and pick up detritus of what they leave behind. In these multiverses, I am well-versed, I am well whether-worn.

Life is a beach.
I appear walking, or is it springing on a beach of ribbed sand. (Blackpool beach probably... it inevitably is.)

The strong wind, and the percussion of the waves is making it difficult to have any intelligible conversation. I have no means of knowing whether your are with me.

In my momentum, I don't have time to leap and simultaneously capture a picture of my/our/your bounds.

We are tracked, we are tagged #rhizo14 
Armed with Hawskey(e)vision we will be able to make the dance patterns of our virtual trajectories magically appear. We may even be able to spot that river-estuary-leap we made before the tide drowned our traces under a sea of nonsense.

Don't you remember, I may have said to you on the beach, "Doesn't that stream ahead look like the Hudson estuary?"

You might be non-plussed by this imaginary dialogue, as you have no satellite view of the Hudson in your mind or you didn't follow me this far on the beach.

Hunting for pirate's treasure.
Let's dig here a while. I know it is cold, we don't have spades and the tide is turning. No matter.  (If only you knew that on this Blackpool beach, there really is a Bucanneer's bounty just under your feet, you wouldn't think the idea so absurd.)

"Dig damn you. We will be rich."  
Reluctantly you deal with the minute possibility that there really is treasure hidden in between these dots...

This is a map of mights. 
There be science in this fiction. Reconcile yourselves to the disintegration of subobjectivity and let it scatter in the world wide wind.

You are confetti...