PUSH and PULL communications

Some people might be critical of my blogging, asking why do I keep on writing, don't I realise that the community are sick and tired of reading my constant carping and "shire bashing", but other readers are either indifferent or encouraging.

The important thing to recognise is the difference between how we use technologies that enable us to communicate. My blog is accessible, but nobody needs to access it. I am not sending my relentless blog posts to your inbox every day, unless you have subscribed to follow the blog. Your choice.

When the reader has to go out and make a conscious decision to read something it is a "pull" technology. You can pull the blog post onto your desktop or tablet to read if you choose. If I sent the posts to your inbox as an email it would be a "push" technology. Push technologies can frequently become an irritation, if the inbox is filled with material of no interest, or if there are many image files and the recipient doesn't have broadband.  It is annoying to wait patiently for an hour or more for your email to download only to find that the cause of the delay is a shire email, complete with graphics, informing you about an arts event in Margaret River that holds no interest for you.

This has been the subject of communication with the shire CEO, but still large emails are being sent out with voluminous content. These are of no use to many of the shire residents, especially those without good broadband connections, as they cannot be shared. All I asked was that the material the shire wanted to disseminate to the community should be placed on the shire website and only the website link sent to our email addresses. This makes for speedy communication, no frustrating waits for downloads, and onward transmission to the people who might be interested is quick and simple, as is posting onto Facebook pages such as the AMRCV.

So remember this if you find my blog posts annoying. I am not pushing, if you read this you are pulling.

Those of us who like to write will, and any critics might like to reflect on the actions of author Lynn Shepherd who gave her own career a set back by comments made about JKRowling.