With the release of the iPhone 3.0 software, the iPhone 3G now has an interesting new feature – tethering. In order to do this in Canada on Rogers or Fido, you must have a 3G data plan of 1GB or higher and be using an iPhone 3G (or 3G S). You must also call Rogers or Fido and get them to enable the plan on your account.

There is another option – do it yourself. All it takes is a simple config file, and because I love you so much, I will now provide them to you at no extra charge.

Here are the simple steps to enabling tethering:

1. Copy, e-mail, or text this URL to your phone: iphone.cdslash.net
2. Visit the URL on your iPhone and choose Rogers or Fido
3. You will be asked whether you want to install the file or not. Tap Install.
4. Confirm that you want to install the file
5. After installation is finished, go to Settings > General > Network, and you should see the option for tethering appear.
6. Enable it, then connect over USB or pair via Bluetooth.

That’s it. Then all you have to do is open Settings > General > Network and enable tethering, and you’re on your way. Plug in via USB or pair via Bluetooth and you’ll find tethering enabled and working.

(Credit where it’s due: I found these files at Adam McNamara’s blog post on the topic)

Update: If you install and something goes wrong, or if you change your mind or whatever, you can uninstall the profile and revert back to the default like so:

1. Open Settings > General > Profiles
2. On this page, you’ll see a heading of ‘Configuration Profiles’, under which should be the update you’ve installed either fido_com or rogers_com. Just tap on that to see more details about it (the same screen you were provided when you installed it).
3. Tap ‘Remove’. This will remove the provisioning profile from your iPhone, which will revert the changes made.
4. Done!

Update 2: This seems to have enabled MMS on Fido as well – MMS wasn’t working for me until I installed this update (but tethering was working fine!) so if MMS isn’t working for you, you can try this too, even if you don’t want to tether your iPhone.

Update 3: If you are getting the message “to enable tethering on this account contact rogers” from your iPhone, then you’ve come to the right place. Going through these steps will fix it.

Update 4: Some people have reported problems with Visual Voicemail. Users affected can’t fetch messages or change their greeting. To see if you’re affected, open your voicemail and try to play back your greeting. If it sits and spins for a few seconds, you’re affected.Thanks to a tip from @andrewe, I’ve fixed the config files. You’ll need to first remove the old ones, then install the new ones.

To uninstall, go to General > Profiles, tap the profile, and remove it. After that’s done, go back to the page and re-download for your carrier, and Visual Voicemail should work again.

I follow a lot of people. I’m not saying I’m following a lot of people. I follow a lot of people. How else are you going to know if they’re relevant to your interests? Interesting people follow me, and I follow back, or vice-versa. That’s how Twitter works after all, and I’m not some high-falutin’ Twitter royal who never has to follow back to be noticed and get involved with people on Twitter.

Err… not involved. Like… involved like interact. Oh nevermind.

Anyway, the inherent problem with this is that I can’t keep track of that many people, and I can’t bear to use Tweetdeck to manage people into groups (sorry, it’s just an awful, brutal client that I can’t bear to use). One day, I noticed that I wasn’t paying attention to Twitter, I was just skimming, but I was barely keeping up. I’d catch up, and then Twitterrific would refresh and I’d have another five minutes of reading to do. It had moved from a tool for communication, like IM, to a distraction, like YouTube or Wikipedia. And I wondered why. And then I figured it out.

My twitter stream was a mess. The signal to noise ratio was so low that I was getting more stuff I don’t want and less stuff I did, and as a result I was missing things. I’d see a tweet from someone in reply to someone else, follow that back to see what they were replying to, and see a tweet that was relevant to my interests that I’d just missed because of all the cruft. I’d miss people inviting me to things, I’d miss DMs or @replies. Twitter had crossed the tipping point from ‘pretty useful’ to ‘completely worthless’. There was no middle ground, it had just suddenly become something I wasn’t enjoying and couldn’t use.

So, I did what any sane person would do, and decided to solve the problem. I went through the list of people I was following and removed those who I knew I wasn’t really interested in hearing from. This included a few CBC accounts, the Associated Press, and so on. Bots were the first to go, and this made my stream more manageable, but it still wasn’t really usable, so it was time for phase two.

I had to decide what I wanted to use Twitter for. I’ve always said that it’s a service that can be something to everyone, but I had to figure out what, specifically, I wanted it to be for me, and I decided on making friends, keeping in touch with them, and learning from them. The main focus for my twitter stream was going to be social, with a secondary focus on learning and sharing knowledge.

With that in mind, now I had a goal to work towards while I trimmed. I went back to my timeline in Twitterrific and started culling. Anyone that tweeted a lot but who didn’t fall into my focus, I unfollowed. Nothing personal. Eventually, I had removed over twenty people, and I continue to trim the list every day, just as I continue to add people.

This might sound a little cold and callous. How can I unfollow my friends? How can I unfollow people I know? Well, maybe to some people it is, but to me it’s practical. If I didn’t do this, then Twitter wouldn’t be useful, I’d stop using it, and I wouldn’t have any friends on Twitter, because I wouldn’t be on Twitter.

I removed a lot of noisy celebrities. I kept iJustine because while she’s almost never relevant to my interests, she’s funny and rarely tweets. I removed Wil Wheaton, because even though he’s hilarious and his tweets are often relevant to my interests, he tweets enough that it contributes more to noise than signal, and the tweets of his that are relevant are generally more of a distraction than anything else.

I removed people I know in person, because despite them being cool people, some of them are almost entirely noise. I carefully considered the content of their tweets, and for some of them, I couldn’t remember the last time they said something interesting. Some people consisted entirely of replies to other people. Replies are fine, but in moderation. Some were always complaining about things, being negative or emo. I don’t need people feeding negativity into my life, because that doesn’t help anyone.

And so I went. I balanced my decision based on how much people were talking, how many of their tweets were relevant to my interests, and what their tweets were like. Some choices were extremely hard, but I still feel like I made the right decision. Some choices were so easy I was amazed I hadn’t done it sooner.

When I post this and people read it, they’ll likely go immediately to Twitter to see if I’m following them. If you discover I’m not, well there could be a lot of reasons. Maybe you’re really cool, but you tweet to other people a lot and it was really distracting. Maybe you tweet often, but your day-to-day interests don’t mesh with mine. Maybe you’re incredibly annoying and I just couldn’t tolerate you anymore. I’m certainly not going to air those grievances in this blog post.

If you’re wondering why I’ve unfollowed you, you will probably consider asking me. I suggest you don’t. Rather, you should look at your twitter stream and see what it is you’re saying. Ask yourself if your tweets are the image you want to project to your followers and the world. Are you being, on Twitter, the person you want to be? If the answer’s yes, then we probably just didn’t mesh well, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Not everyone is destined to be best friends.

If the answer is no, then ask yourself this: if you were me (or anyone else), would you follow you? Why not? For good reasons? For example, I wouldn’t follow me largely because I tend to talk a lot (in fits and starts), but not because, for example, I spend every tweet whining about my life. If you’re not being the person you want to be, then work on that.

Either way, don’t angst over why I unfollowed you. If you’re still following me, feel free to unfollow me. I won’t get emo about it. If you’re looking for suggestions on how to improve things, I could theoretically give that, but really, that would be like giving life advice, and I’m no counsellor.

Maybe in the future, if things change, I’ll follow you again. Maybe not. Either way, you shouldn’t really care. I’m just one guy, after all, and my opinion of you shouldn’t matter. It’s your opinion of you that does.

Incidentally, I know that I could tell Twitter not to show me @-replies to other users – but that would be silly. That’s how I found 90% of the people I’m following on Twitter right now, through other people replying to them. Joining into an interesting conversation or following along. I don’t want to lose the ‘network’ part of social networking any more than the ‘social’ part. I mean, you wouldn’t go to a party just to talk to the friends you already have, would you?

The new media forum is aimed at inspiring and engaging “those who want to tell stories in a more interactive space.”
It’s a tall order and one I’m happy to be taking part in, joining writer and social media evangelist Monica Hamburg, creative producer and social media consultant Carol Sill and creative producer and writer Erica Hargreave on the morning’s “Social Media How To” panel.

Among the people featured are Vancouver’s A-list social media celebrities, and also myself. I’m not sure how I stumbled into this, but it’s pretty exciting.

My task, as I understand it, will be to do what I do best, or at least most often: tweet. We’ll be in the audience and at the brunch, talking about what’s going on, and sharing our experiences with the world, and showing how interactive of a forum social media outlets like Twitter can be.

I’m pretty excited to see the masters in action and to meet the few socmed legends I haven’t had a chance to rub shoulders with (is that a real expression, or did I just make that up?), so that will be awesome. It’ll also be nice to finally be recognized for my ability to talk pretty much endlessly on Twitter despite having nothing to say, and I’m glad I can put one of my few talents to good use.

If you’re interested, you should also consider checking out the film festival proper, which looks to be an exciting showcase worth seeing.

If you didn’t get a chance to see me trendsurf on Twitter at the Twestival, you’ll can have another opportunity at the New Media Forum for only $75 for the day, which includes access to all the forums and I’ll even pretend like I recognize you from the internets in front of your friends, so they think you’re famous. If you’re going to come, though, you should really pick up the full monty for $145 which gets you in to all the films as well.

I’ll be there with special guest Leah Bancroft, who both is a woman and watches films, which will be a great synergy I think, so pick up your passes, come down next week, and say hello, and I promise to at least act like I recognize you from your Twitter avatar even though your name just barely escapes me.

Update: Erica pointed out in the comments that there’s no official brunch, but if we all bring a bagel or something we can eat them some time in the morning and then you can tell everyone you were at an exclusive brunch with me and then everyone will want to hang around with you in the hopes that they can get tickets to Fleetwood Mac or something.

What I was referring to as ‘brunch’ is actually the reception, which is at the end of the day, which isn’t really when you receive things because that’s when everyone’s leaving, but it doesn’t really matter because there’s going to be beer. I was going to say ‘free beer’ but I didn’t want this to turn out like the whole brunch fiasco did and have an angry mob telling everyone I promised them free beer.

One portrait of obsessive-compulsives was the 1997 film As Good as It Gets, starring Jack Nicholson as a writer who has a strict routine, including sitting at the same table at the same restaurant every day, being served by the same waitress, and so on. When forced out of his routine, he becomes agitated and (as I recall) seems rather panicked.

Obsessive-compulsive disorder has a few criteria for diagnosis. The DSM IV defines obsessions as recurrent thoughts, impulses, or images that are intrusive and caused anxiety or distress, which are not excessive worries about actual problems. The person knows that they’re all in his or her head and tries to suppress them because they are interfering with the sufferer’s life.

An example for this might be a friend I once knew, who, as a child, had images of her own (extremely violent) death suddenly running through her mind, out of nowhere. She would be walking down the street and suddenly have an image in her mind of herself running into traffic, dying in an excessively (and unrealistically) violent fashion. She didn’t understand why she kept having these images; she wondered if she was suicidal, but given that she didn’t feel suicidal, that seemed unlikely.

Compulsions are repetitive behaviours that the person is compelled to perform, either according to a rigid set of rules, or as in response to an obsession. The behaviours are meant to prevent or at least reduce distress, or prevent something bad from happening, but the compulsion is not related to the event, or is excessive. 

To be diagnosed with OCD, you must have either an obsession, a compulsion, or both. I always thought I might be mildly obsessive-compulsive, but after reading the description from Wikipedia (my source for the above), I came to the conclusion that I’m not. Even ‘mildly’ obsessive-compulsive individuals would have to follow the above criteria, it just wouldn’t be ‘as bad’.

I started wondering what might explain the situation that I had, the symptoms, if you will, that I thought were odd or unusual that other people didn’t seem to have. I wondered if it was maybe just the way I was, that there wasn’t anything wrong with me and I was just weird about things. A little more research indicated that I might be right.

I came across another Wikipedia article about a similar-but-different condition called ‘obsessive compulsive personality disorder‘, and this sounded, to me, a lot more like me. OCD, as mentioned above, is a troubling, intrusive set of obsessions or compulsions that disrupt a person’s life, that they know is excessive, and that they try to deal with, and that didn’t fit me.

Some examples from Wikipedia:

• Time becomes a problem when they dwell for so long on getting something “right” that they stand the chance of not finishing in time. (I was terrible for this in high school)
• They may even insist on taking over a task someone else is doing so that it will be done properly. (‘Here, let me do it’)
• Uncleanliness is, in the eyes of some OCPD individuals, a form of lack of perfection, as is untidiness. (When my apartment isn’t tidy, I don’t want to go home)
• Money is of concern because many OCPD sufferers are anxious about the potential for things to go wrong in their lives. (more than somewhat)
• They may hoard items for a ‘rainy day’. (oh yes)

I could go on (ironically, I would love to make an exhaustive list), but you get the idea. Sets. Counting. Particulars. ‘Sort by file type’. It’s all mild stuff, and it’s nothing I can’t stop doing – if I have to. I just don’t want to. Why would I?

Most people I know or meet don’t know the extent of it. I’ve learned subtle tricks to pick the table I want at a restaurant, I buy DVDs as part of a set or not at all, and so on.

This may be part of the reason that I don’t get along with most people long-term. It may also be the reason that I tend to want to do projects ‘right’, in a complete manner – which, combined with my ADD, can often result in projects not getting completed at all.

So what to do about it? Well, nothing. OCPD isn’t generally a diagnosed disorder and isn’t generally treated. In extreme cases, medications can be prescribed; in less extreme cases, therapy. In my case? I’m probably ok. Most of what I do I’ve learned to deal with, and once you’re aware of the problem it gets a lot easier.

This is a perfect example of a point I was trying to make in my previous post on mental health. Just because you have a disorder or condition doesn’t mean you’re crazy. There’s a label to the way I behave, but I’m not defined by that label. Just like you can have ten red cars, none of which are exactly the same colour, you can have ten people with OCPD (or anxiety disorder, or ADD), all of whom are different – each of whom is their own person.

We are not defined by our labels, but they are a convenient way to ‘ballpark’ certain things. Telling someone a car is red doesn’t tell them exactly what shade of red the car is, but it gives them an idea. Telling someone that you have a certain condition or disorder doesn’t tell them what you’re like, but it might put things about you into perspective.

Obsessive-compulsive personality disorder is a real disorder, classified in the DSM IV-TR (the same place you’ll find OCD described). It’s real, not just something that some group made up to get sympathy, or something doctors use to make excuses for patients. Yet, I’m not crazy. I’m not in a psych ward. I’m not even taking medication for it – and people don’t even know that I have it (until they read this, I suppose).

So again, if you have issues, don’t be afraid to talk about them. If you’re worried people will think you’re crazy – chances are those aren’t the kinds of people whose opinions should matter to anyone, least of all you. Don’t be afraid to talk to people about it. What’s important isn’t hiding the problem so no one besides you sees it, but rather working on the problem so that no one – including you – has to worry about it.

We were speaking the other day about his issues, and I suggested that he speak with someone about them, and this is where it gets complicated because it’s a hard thing to do without coming across completely wrong. You see, people don’t want to be ‘crazy’. They don’t want to be ‘weird’ or ‘broken’ or any of a thousand other negative adjectives. There’s a stigma attached to mental health that people have a lot of trouble getting around, and no one wants to talk about it or confront it.

Most people that I know who have mental health problems don’t want to talk to anyone about them. They don’t want to cross the line from ‘personality quirk’ to ‘mental health issue’, because they think that if they do, that makes them crazy. Only crazy people take pills, right? Only crazy people need medication to function normally in society. So since they’re not crazy, and don’t want people to think they’re crazy, they convince themselves that that’s not what it is. It’s just a personality quirk, and if they work hard enough, try hard enough, and just smile whenever they can, they can become a better person, they can ‘fix’ what’s wrong and everything will be ok.

My friend expressed a longstanding concern that taking psychoactive drugs changes who you are. It’s a feeling I’ve heard expressed many times, and my response is always the same – it’s the issue at hand, the depression, the anxiety, the panic, that changes who you are. It gets in the way of you being you, it prevents you from living your own life. You become beholden to this problem, waking up in a panic, grinding your teeth in your sleep, or swinging wildly from one emotional extreme to the next.

I liken it to a physical disability, such as losing an arm. It changes you, it changes how you act and how others perceive you. It changes how you’re able to deal with the world, and how the world can deal with you. Getting a prosthetic arm isn’t the same, not entirely, but it gives you back a lot of what you’ve lost. You can carry things, you can wave to people, you can sort through your change without dumping it on the table. You can get back a large part of what made you who you are, by getting rid of what’s preventing you from being yourself.

The important thing to understand is that there’s a difference between having a mental health issue and being ‘crazy’. Crazy, to me, implies that you are unaware of your surroundings, incapable of comprehending what’s around you. The homeless guy staggering down the street shouting at someone who isn’t there about his yogurt baseball is crazy. The cute girl that you see in the elevator every day, the one who takes one pill in the morning and one pill at lunch so that she doesn’t have to deal with crippling anxiety all day, is not crazy.

When I was in my teen years, I felt pretty bad about myself. I wasn’t able to finish anything, I couldn’t concentrate on a project long enough to follow through. I couldn’t pay attention in class, and when I tried to get anything done, even a fun project that I enjoyed, I was never able to finish. It became so bad that eventually, I wouldn’t even try anything. I’d get an idea for a neat project, but put it aside. I wouldn’t bother to learn new things, because I could never use them. I felt like I was useless, like I would never amount to anything and I would always be the pathetic failure that I knew I was.

For ten years, I felt that way – that I wouldn’t accomplish anything, that I didn’t deserve to have anything good happen to me because I couldn’t even put in a little effort to show I wanted it. Then one day, I came across something on Wikipedia that described me better than even I knew myself. It told me how I felt depressed and useless, how I could never do anything or follow through on a project. It described how I would avoid committing to anything because of a crippling fear of failure, and how, night after night, I would just get more and more depressed about feeling worthless.

The something that I came across was the Wikipedia article on adult ADHD – specifically the section on inattentive ADHD (vs. hyperactive ADHD). When I read that, it was like a revelation. All this time, I had thought there was something inherently, irreversibly wrong with me, that I had some monumental character flaw that I was born with, an inherent loserishness I couldn’t surpass no matter how hard I tried. This page, however, described me in exact detail, and, more importantly, described a (possible) solution – stimulants. Stimulants change the way the brain works, accelerating the production of hormones that regulate the brain’s ability to pay attention. More production = more attention. Sure enough, I started to realize that I was only truly productive when I was drinking energy drinks.

The revelation wasn’t that I had ADD. The revelation was that it wasn’t me that was broken. Sure, my brain didn’t work quite right, but that’s largely a mechanical problem. My eyes don’t work quite right either, but I don’t get depressed about wearing glasses – and why would I? I can see how many other people need them. There’s no stigma attached.

Are you having a problem, or is someone you know? Do you feel broken, or feel like there’s something wrong with you, like you can’t behave the way you’re supposed to? Do you feel anxious all the time, or nervous, or swing wildly from one emotional extreme to the other? Do you feel sad or depressed all the time, like nothing’s ever gone right and never will? And most importantly, do you feel that you can’t talk to anyone because they wouldn’t understand?

There are people who will understand. Maybe those people aren’t your parents or your friends or your coworkers, but that doesn’t mean you’re alone. There are people with problems that you can talk to, and they do know what you’re going through and how it feels. More importantly, they can help you get your life back on track, and help you deal with the problems you have. A lot of people have issues, large or small, but regardless of how mine compare to yours or yours compare to Wil’s, we still understand what you’re going through, and we’re not going to judge you for it.

If you can muster up the courage (and believe me, it’s tough), speak to your doctor about it. I know it’s hard, and it took me years to do, but if you can, do it. If you can’t, and believe me there’s no shame in that, then drop me a line. Post an anonymous comment, friend me on Twitter or Facebook, and I can help show you that it’s not impossible to get your life back.