The Forum and Facebook

[leonardmtl]

Joe,

Thanks for expressing the trepidation we all felt as we first tried to navigate the new technology .....and, in spite of these clouds, still enables us to join in the wonderful nourishment this Forum provides....from initial missteps replaced with an appreciation of the landscape of 'friends", each taking the risk of revealing of their thoughts and personalitites, ..........with a graciousness (most times!)that Leonard leads us to express.

And now, with FB, we can accelerate these connections with more personal insights, experiences, shared non-Leonard interests.

We Luddites never had it so good!

Leonard from Montreal

[Joe Way]

Thank you all for the very kind words. This is a wonderful place to have a chance to meet new people who share our interest in Leonard's work. That it can also lead to even deeper friendships is what seems to have made it extraordinary in my mind.

And, Doron for all my proclaiming about loving the scholarly aspects of Leonard's work, I have been too long absent from those discussions. Thank you for your gentle reminders to begin participating again.

Joe

[joyezekiel]

I only recently (somewhat reluctantly) joined FB, and was delighted to receive communications from many of the Forum members I've met over the past three years. I think it's wonderful that Leonard Cohen has fostered new friendships all around the world, and FB offers an opportunity to get to know my new friends even better, and enables us to share stuff which would be inappropriate to discuss on this Forum. It doesn't stop me having my daily "fix" of the Forum.

On the "newbie" issue..... I guess I would be considered to be a recent member, but in fact I've been an avid LC fan since 1968, and I did in fact join the Forum many years ago. I was intimidated by the facct that everyone seemed to know each other, and so I don't think I ever posted anything. I often logged in and had a look around, but eventually I forgot my user name and password, so rejoined during the recent tour. I suspect that there are many others like me.

Oh... and I don't feel intimidated any more!

Joy

[clive cass]

Can anyone advise me how to start to communicate with Cohenites on Facebook. I have a facebook page but have never understood how to use it and I certainly have no idea how to contact anyone or make friends with people who have particular interests.

[brightnow]

Can anyone advise me how to start to communicate with Cohenites on Facebook. I have a facebook page but have never understood how to use it and I certainly have no idea how to contact anyone or make friends with people who have particular interests.

Clive, you may want to start by visiting the Leonard Cohen page on Facebook and clicking "Like": http://www.facebook.com/pages/Leonard-C ... 4379090603
You will find that many fans "like" this page and have posted on it.

Another good page to "Like" is "The Poetry of Leonard Cohen": http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Poetr ... 7438949260
(I think this one was started by Christine?)

[Mabeanie1]

I have a facebook page but have never understood how to use it.

You are not alone Clive! I set up a page a year or two ago and have made friends with a couple of people but I didn't really know how to use it and, to be honest, didn't really see the point so my page has remained dormant. Why do you need Facebook when there are e-mails and message boards and .... telephones for communicating with friends and family?

Having said that I may just follow Avi's links and see where they take me.

Wendy

[remote1]

Can anyone advise me how to start to communicate with Cohenites on Facebook. I have a facebook page but have never understood how to use it and I certainly have no idea how to contact anyone or make friends with people who have particular interests.

Clive, you may want to start by visiting the Leonard Cohen page on Facebook and clicking "Like": http://www.facebook.com/pages/Leonard-C ... 4379090603
You will find that many fans "like" this page and have posted on it.

Another good page to "Like" is "The Poetry of Leonard Cohen": http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Poetr ... 7438949260
(I think this one was started by Christine?)

Ok, I created a Facebook account, visited the Leonard Cohen page and clicked "like", but all I can see is a quotation from Wikipedia. Am I missing something obvious?

[musicmania]

Avi's link is for a community page. You can't connect with people via them. Leonard's official FB page is at this link

http://www.facebook.com/#!/leonardcohen

While I visit that page everyday I'd be wary of making connections unless it is of people with mutual friends. Since you are new to FB you don't have that advantage so try going to this page where many of us have regular contact and indeed many of the members there are members of the Forum.

http://www.facebook.com/#!/group.php?gid=238621762498

[anneporter]

Those who are going to Hydra might want to check out this Facebook event:
https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=119815584753388

[remote1]

Avi's link is for a community page. You can't connect with people via them. Leonard's official FB page is at this link

http://www.facebook.com/#!/leonardcohen

While I visit that page everyday I'd be wary of making connections unless it is of people with mutual friends. Since you are new to FB you don't have that advantage so try going to this page where many of us have regular contact and indeed many of the members there are members of the Forum.

http://www.facebook.com/#!/group.php?gid=238621762498

Thanks Musicmania!

[mnkyface]

I am surprised that no one has mentioned the FB page that womanfromaroom (Ann-Kristin) started quite a while ago for the specific purpose of linking Forum and FB members: https://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid= ... 915&v=wall

In the "discussion" section, among other things, there is a topic called "nicknames" which I have found very useful.

[DBCohen]

As I’ve anticipated, more people are joining Facebook now… This just goes to show that intentions (good or bad) don’t matter.

Thanks everyone for the links and guidance.

[burningviolin]

Facebook or forum? Well, both actually. facebook was very handy to get to know people before going to the meetup in Barcelona which was my first big meetup. It meant at least I knew what some people looked like! It made it much easier to go over and chat to people. Then having met so many people at meetups those people became friends (not that you can't be friends just via the forum here of course that is possible too) and so my facebook page is a way to connect with them. I also post things on facebook that are personal to me and I don't want the whole world to see hence the privacy settings allow me to limit those who can see my posts. Here, it's wide open to the whole internet, a scary prospect when you really think about it.

It's obvious to me that after the tour that a fall off in visits to the forum or posts on the forum is inevitable. I was following the tour by reading the concert reports every day and checking in while the tour was active. That isn't to say that I'm less of a fan now, it's just natural that I have somewhat less of an interest in all things Cohen on a 24/7 basis when he isn't in the public eye. I don't like his poetry or music less, but there is a natural ebb and flow to ones interest in all things!

Having said all that I wanted to add that I have been made to feel very welcome on the forum here, I remember Lizzy LadyDi and MaryB (and the rest of you of course) from the beginning. As for the the 'newbie argument' or about people joining the forum and not contributing or 'not getting it' or whatever the argument may be about people who join up here (I didn't real all the posts on the thread) I find that to be irritating and really tactless. Not everyone has the same level of interest in all things Leonard Cohen, but if someone took the time to join the forum it's because they had some interest in Leonard Cohen and his music. Fair enough it may have only ran so far as to be in the running for presale tickets or whatever but some people just have an interest in Leonard, they don't particularly want to talk to other fans about him (in the flesh yes, but on a public forum no), they'd rather go to see him live for the first time, 55th time or first time in 15 years....all of which is perfectly acceptable.

[Mordy]

Interesting topic.

It's obvious to me that after the tour that a fall off in visits to the forum or posts on the forum is inevitable. I was following the tour by reading the concert reports every day and checking in while the tour was active. That isn't to say that I'm less of a fan now, it's just natural that I have somewhat less of an interest in all things Cohen on a 24/7 basis when he isn't in the public eye. I don't like his poetry or music less, but there is a natural ebb and flow to ones interest in all things!

I agree. Whilst the tour was happening I was visiting almost daily - indeed, I was worried that I was becoming a bit obsessive ... Before the tour I was unaware of the forum, because for me the computer was something I used for work rather than pleasure (a bit Luddite, I know!), and it was thanks to the tour that I took the time to discover the Leonard Cohen files - and I'm so glad I did! I really enjoy reading some of the discussions about LC's work, and it's thanks to one of these sorts of discussions that I'm now acquainted with, amongst other concepts, Shrodinger's Cat - so the forum is very good for all sorts of discoveries! Some of these discussions are very erudite, and I might not contribute anything as I don't feel confident that I could contribute anything useful. I don't use Facebook because ... well, I just don't ... maybe I should ... I don't know whether I want to spend any more time looking at a screen.

I can't help thinking, though - if you consider the hundreds of thousands of people who flocked the tour concerts over the last three years, I wonder what proportion of these follow the forum - or the Facebook pages. Probably pretty small. But they're all admirers - LC has a special part in their lives - and they might not necessarily want or need to spend time following a forum or Facebook pages.

See you on Facebook - or not

[clive cass]

Thanks everyone for your assistance. Hope to see you on facebook but I will also keep using the forum