My 13 year old son wanted to know why I was going to San Francisco last night. I told to him I was going to see the author and social anthropologist Clay Shirky. Typically he doesn’t want to know much more after that type of answer but he was curious and asked – “Why?”

My son is an avid San Francisco Giants fan and loves Pablo Sandoval and Tim Lincecum. So I told  him that Clay Shirky to me is like Tim Lincecum to him.  He immediately got it, smiled and went back to playing Call of Duty satisfied that I was getting to do something that is coveted, comforting and entertaining.

Clay was all of that last night and more.  He extolled the detriments of HR googling potential new hires and trimming the talent pool to getting us to understand that developing countries are developers and are cranking out useful tools for the world (it’s not just silicon valley anymore – so don’t be surprised).

I picked up his latest book – Cognitive Surplus I highly recommend it – the guy is a genius when it comes to relating the social aspects of media today to how we can live and thrive in this three ring circus.

His latest twitter Bio give some insight into what Cognitive Surplus is all about:

Twitter Bio: Bald. Unreliable. Easily distracte

Enjoy!