The Top Thinkers of Beyond the Rhetoric

While some of the people on the list of Top Thinkers for the month of November 2012 are people who also appeared in October’s list, there are a few notable differences too, including one newcomer. It’s great to see when the Beyond the Rhetoric community is growing and reaching new audiences. If you want to appear on this list for December, be sure to leave lots of comments on the posts!

Topping the list is Ray Ebersole once again. Over on his own blog, he recently wrote about how Thanksgiving has changed in recent years, becoming less about the family traditions and more about door busters and Black Friday deals. Indeed, because many retailers start their Black Friday deals at midnight, turkey dinner on Thursday can become preempted by people wanting to join those shopping lines early.

Next, we have Zagorath, who is currently undergoing a rather dramatic transformation. He is slowly moving away from his anonymity-protecting nickname and toward using his real name–Jim Cullen–for his Internet activities. He has a post on the benefits of publicness and, for the most part, I agree. There is something to be said about privacy and anonymity, but there is also something to be said about personal branding and leveraging your legitimacy online too.

And then we have Betshopboy, who is quite the avid runner. He participates in several marathons, but the Penang Bridge International last month was his first overseas marathon and it was his “toughest” to date. That was quite a different experience for him and he documented the whole thing, talking about arrival at the hotel, getting ready at the pre-race, and enjoying the festivities of the post-race too.

With the only non-English blog in this list of top thinkers, we turn to AOA. Through the magic of Google Translate, I’m able to glean that his most recent post is about a night visit to the hospital, but the translation is far from perfect. It seems like quite the heart-felt post, so if you can read Chinese, you can head on over to his site for a good read.

Finally, there is Audra taking the fifth and final spot. Her site is mostly about automobile accessories, talking about all the different parts and add-ons that you can get. For example, there is an article on car seat covers and how they can protect your car seats from damage while providing a customized look for the interior of your vehicle. Just make sure the cover doesn’t get in the way of any airbags you may have.