If you still follow me you know that a while ago I talked here about one of my research projects (Attention Wiki) [Link to that Post]. I recently found out that Mohammad Keyhani (Attention Wiki’s Co-founder) has deleted my account and changed my role from co-founder to contributor in early stages

Mr. Keyhani has abused his administrative rights and deleted my account without my consent. I’ll start again as knowledge is for all and cyberspace has lots of corners and in the long run his actions are probably not that important. Mohammad Keyhani (also spelled kaihani) is obsessed with associating his name with what he calls the discipline of attention economy and will do anything to keep it to himself. pitiful. Only time will tell what strategy wins.

Link to Mohammad Keyhani’s English Blog

Link to Attention Wiki

screenshot of attention wiki main page on 3/22/2008:

Two more rejection letters today. From UCLA and University of Minnesota. Painful! Minnesota and UCLA were both very desired schools. This decreases my chances of being admitted even more.

To give you an update, so far I am rejected from these Business Schools (all PhD programs):

1. London Business School in Londo, UK.
2. INSEAD in France.
3. Texas A&M in College park, Texas
4. University of Souther Florida in Tampa, Florid.
5. University of Washington in Seattle, Washington
6. UCLA in Los Angeles, California.
7. University of Minnesota in Twin cities, Minnesota

Keeping fingers crossed? well, No! simply keeping my hopes high and working on Plan B.

Continuing my house-cleaning for the new year, I changed the theme of both of my blogs today. I have also decided to change the content and general direction of both of them. Normally I whined about how-awful-iran-is in my Farsi blog and wrote about other stuff in here. I think a reversal of roles may be productive.

Iran is bit of a mysterious country and I think providing an insider look into it’s culture and social context may be useful. Also, writing about the outside world in Farsi is also productive as the Iranian community and especially those living in Iran are semi detached from the outside world.

Still, I will sometimes jump back and forth and deviate from this presented plan.

Hope it works out.

It’s the end of Persian year of 1386 and it’s time for the traditional house-cleaning for Nowruz. House cleaning (In Farsi Khane-Tekani) involves cleaning the house and also closing all the open loops in ones life; finishing unfinished projects and doing things left undone, Hence I am writing this post at the end of which I’ll present a purpose and plan for this blog.

But before I get to that for let me update you on what happened in the recent episode of my life so you know where I’m standing and why I want to end this blog as it is and re-open it as the new form that I intend:

If you know me personally you probably know that I was applying for a number of PhD programs. You may also know that I have been  rejected from some of my most desired schools. Applications was a sad experience for me as I found out that many of my most beloved scientists had very recently passed away (like Erin Anderson and Anatol Rapaport and please don’t ask for the complete list as I can’t get through it).

Recieving rejections from these schools was certainly a happy ending for this happy process.  Paying an application fee of, often, 150$ and then wishfully waiting for a positive answer and then receiving a  nice letter that tells you “you’re not actually that good” is probably the worst kind of torture.  A kind of torture that, by the way, I am currently going through.

All of this -as good as it may sound- made me realize important things about my life and what I want to do with it. If you like the term, I had an epiphany in the middle of all the fun. A lot of this comes from a friend of mine who got accepted to a program and started to act totally different as if he’s more important or more human than I am. He changed behavior! Not saying hello and not saying goodbyes. It was interesting since we did many research projects together and also shared many of the schools we applied to.

The epiphany was not, niether not-to-be-arrogant nor be-happy-regardless-of-what-happens. These were obvious. What I found out was out whole system of social advancement is based upon rules that have nothing with the personality advancement of individuals. In other words you need not be a good person or and understanding one in order to get to high places, be it presidency; be it  a PhD program. Hitler and my old friend are compelling evidence on this.

This observation made me decide to change my attitude towards life and take development of personality as seriously as professional and academic life ( a fading dream these days), never to change into either Hitler or my old friend.

What did all this have to do with my house-cleaning? well nothing actually. Please bare that as a part of my bloggery-narcissistic personality type. And I also had to take all of that pain off my chest.

About the blog, I think you (the 5 or 6 people who visit this humble corner of the blogsphere) should decide. After all you are the customer and as the only (and only)  teaching of marketing says you are right, whatever that may mean.

I think it would be appropriate if I present to you an insider view of Iran. True enough to give you a better perspective, and careful enough not get me killed or sent to Evin prison. I will also talk about my Academic interests and try to present a background talk on what I am doing in that area (as I have no other place to say those things).

Hope that works out for everyone…

I’ll cut to the chase. I’ve made something new!

A Collaborative English-Farsi Word-set (to become a dictionary someday…) 

You can find more details about it here (English) & here (Farsi). You can Access it here.

Folks, I have no time to explain.

Just see the comic and if you like it visit our (?) latest invention:

The Attention Economics Wiki

By the way, some knowledge sharing: Don’t ever apply for PhD programs, have exams and accept projects at the same time. It will kill you!

Parviz Tanavali is one of the most respected Iranian Artists and probably the last living legend in the rather empty hall of fame of Iranian Sculptors. A few Month ago one of his sculptures titled “ْGrowth” (رويش in Farsi) was removed from Iranian embassy’s front-yard in Paris and then destroyed. (News Source in Farsi) To me, as well as many, these tragedies are unbearable especially in this time of artistic depression in Iran.

I think to myself what did the embassy workers thought when they were removing the sculpture. They probably thought to themselves that it’s just a piece of decoration. Interestingly these people think of a religious object as sacred and would not touch it without washing their hands and faces (the practice of Vozu in Islam) first.

The last couple of days, I have been reading a magnificent book, namely “Adventures of a bystander” by Peter F. Drucker (amazon) (publisher). The fame of Mr. Drucker is by no means unknown in the realm of management science but what is interesting in this work of art ,as I see it, is the meaning it brings to a quote from another scholar, Soren Kierkegaard.

Kierkegaard said “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”

The problem with that sentence is that it is often too late to live when you finally understand life. Being an optimist I think most people understand what life “means” much sooner than their days of old but even then the lost time is lost forever. Let’s face it you are never 19 twice.

That is exactly my rationale in designating Drucker’s book as magnificent. Drucker was an influential man and much of his “influentiality”, he owed to knowing many many key figures from government officials to university professors to SS officers. Reading his book gives insight in how choosing one path in life over another affects the fate of that person. How it makes some thrive and others fail. That, in my opinion, is a must have but expensive knowledge.

I never even imagined that one day I follow a career to become a teacher, let alone it becoming my dream in life.

Yes, I want to be a university professor. That does not exactly mean teaching but teaching is an inseparable part of being an academic.

When I was little, I always liked to be a commercial pilot. For some reason, in my naivety as a child, I thought a pilot was superior to all other professionals.

That belief probably originated because pilots were the boss of the sky. They are not, but kids don not understand the many complexities in the society. That is probably why we call them both naive and creative.

Now that I think of it, I am choosing the Academic track because of the very same reasons that the then kiddo selected Aviation. University professors have no evident boss. They are the boss of the classroom and hold a very powerful tool, namely the final exam.

But I am not going to be that kind of professor. I am choosing academia because there are possibilities to be explored. Discoveries to be made. And beliefs in the conventional wisdom that call to be refuted.

In that, I lay my heart.