Thang Nguyen 555

Cultures on Collision Course

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With some short-term relief work in Asia/Africa and long stint in Telecom, Thang also earned a B.A. at Pennsylvania State University. M.A. in Communication at Wheaton Graduate School, M.A. in Cross-Cultural Communication at Gordon-Conwell Seminary, Boston. In addition, he earned a CELTA – classes taken in Hanoi for cultural re-immersion.

Tag: Youtube

  • Lonely crowd

    Back in the 60’s , David Riesman already concluded that “the more might not be the merrier”. Social network researchers have come up with diverse conclusions about Facebook and Internet use. Passive vs active participation makes a difference whether we are happier or less happy when using social media. We have yet fully exploited this…

  • Poor substitute

    We are so connected (Google Fiber) and disconnected (from people) at the same time. Starting with TV broadcast which reduces viewership from a theatre like in “Cinema Paradiso” down to a nuclear family in their living room, to a Youtube video download for personal  use. With smart phones, we don’t have people knocking on the phone booth for their turn or get…

  • Again

    Thought I saw the last of it. Snow again. The element of surprise, overused, lessened with each encore. I saw Paul Anka the other day on PBS. He did it “his way”. And then another encore. Again. The audience was on their feet, not wanting to leave. But then, everything, including good times, has to end.…

  • Dance clips

    My daughter went pro on YouTube with the Academy of Swag (Don’t Like, or Matrix, or World of Dance – International Hip Hop Competition). Happy New Year! She got my dancing genes. But more disciplined and better trained since the age of 6. With every successive generation, we witness a shift in speed, style and…

  • Self-decoding

    Our gene distribution and mutation have a lot in common (survival instinct, reproduction, empathy etc…). But from there, each of us is different and unique: some poets, others warriors or both. Haruki Murakami is both a writer and a runner (100 km race).  Richard Blanco, who will recite at Obama’s Inauguration, is both an engineer and…

  • Twitter and Tolstoy

    My new-year resolution is to get through Tolstoy‘s monumental “War and Peace.” The characters and ethos were deliberate and elaborating (everyone wants a piece of the inheritance while the man was dying etc….). Visitors were announced at the gate (no intercom), received at party etc…. Tolstoy’s imperialistic people have time on their hands. We don’t. We tweet,…

  • Marconi and Marcom

    In the late 80’s, PacTel Cellular boasted seamless connection from San Francisco to San Diego. That is, if you had a battery pack to power the wireless devices (MicroTac? Motorola). Remember this was pre-Twitter days. Now it’s 12/12/12 and the Mayan’s calendar is soon running out. Back when Marconi was experimenting with sending signals across the…

  • (You) Tube and Toast

    The English had their toasts (toasters) thanks to electricity. I’ve got my music thanks to Youtube. Each generation tries to outdo the previous one. My daughters would read about Mars, not Moon (I blogged about the excitement of waiting in line for hours to see that rock brought back from the Moon). Thanks YouTube. The three founders…

  • Your story

    During the 60’s, when computers were too limited for personal use, Andy Warhol had already predicted that in the future (which is NOW) each of us would have 15 minutes of fame (just like his signature Campbell soup ). Naturally, he couldn’t have predicted the rise of social media  which upend traditional broadcast media, turning it…

  • Reading Idea Man

    What would you do if you hit the PowerBall jackpot? Paul Allen, Idea Man, had several ideas: space travel, mind mapping and music. What would you do if you had no money at all? You would day-dream (travel inside your mind), visualize what you would do if  you had money (like Charlie Chaplin, leaning out of the…