Microbe Monday - The Practicalist

I spent a little time exploring some of the Insignificant Microbes in the Ecosystem when I came across Ben Clemens' blog, The Practicalist. I found some great posts. Here's one with a quote from Einstein that I heartily second.

We act as though comfort and luxury were the chief requirements of life, when all that we need to make us happy is something to be enthusiastic about.
— Albert Einstein

Ben's also got a good post about the utility of Digg and it's brethren.

the mob effects enabled by Digg, Slashdot, Technorati, and especially TechCrunch (which is a more a publicity firm than a blog, despite great instincts and virtuoso promotion of what I agree are good startups) are not the social Web at all, just reflections of existing and very old dynamics around attention -- more similar to the effects of traditional publicity than anything really new. On Digg and Slashdot and in the world of traditional press, seeking and getting attention is the coin of the realm, and people participate in these systems in order to create and promote their identity.

Read the whole thing. It's got an angle I had never thought of.

Nice blog, Ben! The only thing I would change would be having to register in order to comment. I've blogged about that problem before.

Update: TTLB still hasn't picked up these links. As of now, Ben's ranked #38,714. Let's see if it goes up in the next few days.