Breaking News
Ward One city councilor Ed Adrian will be tweeting live from city council meetings starting Monday. His twitter page is here: http://twitter.com/CouncilorAdrian
In related news, I just found out that I've been mixing up the Heisenberg uncertainty principle (the idea that the precision with which one can measure a particle's position is inversely proportional to the precision with which one can measure its momentum) and the observer effect (the idea that the method by which something is observed changes what it's observing).
How embarassing. For years I've been pontificating on the Heisenberg uncertainty principle as if it were the observer effect. Live and learn.
Is the observer effect absolute? Is it possible to observe something without changing it? Certainly not in Ed's case. It's a logical certainty that anything a councilor does in a council meeting changes the meeting. The question is will the change, will the effect of one councilor tweeting a meeting result in something beyond his own distraction?
Well Dude, we just don't know.
I think that twittering from council meetings is like talking on a cell phone, checking messages or texting in the middle of a meeting. Though it's silent, it's taking away the person's focus from the meeting. It's not the kind of multitasking I like to see.
ReplyDeleteI have the same problem when councilors are talking among themselves during a meeting while others and/or the members of the public are talking. Or getting up from the table and leaving for ten minutes - presumably to go the restroom. (Can't you go before you get there?) I've seen this type of behavior time and again during council meetings from many different councilors.
How can they pay attention to what is going on when they are not totally focused on it?
Pam
ReplyDeleteI work in a profession where I need to multitask. I think that I can pay attention, discuss the issues and take notes (or Twitter) all at once. I even ran the meeting for a short period of time tonight. Check out my tweets and let me know what you think. This is an experiment so I am happy to receive thoughts from people.
http://twitter.com/CouncilorAdrian
Best
Ed