Monthly Archive for August, 2002

Marc Andresson states that “All of the technology underneath the Internet is hitting critical mass, at the exact point when people expect nothing. That’s a prescription for the next boom. But I don’t know when.”

Scott Rosenberg agrees. And you know, it makes a lot of sense. Why didn’t I think of that? Anyway,this makes me very happy.

UPN’s “Buffy the Vampire Slayerâ€? was rated the worst show in prime-time, with the PTC condemning it for graphic violence and sex, and an element of the occult.

Ooh, the occult! How inappropriate! Wouldn’t want children to see the occult…do these people even watch the show?

In all fairness, the strong sexual content, and, to a much lesser extent, the violence in this last season make the show not very appropriate for young viewers. But…the occult? WTF?

anyway, Maintex’s server (mop.maintex.com) should be back for good now…so hopefully the same holds for AgBlog. While there are lots of things to report, I can’t think of any of them off hand, so I’ll just put up a very nice quote I found: Do I contradict myself? Very well, then, I contradict myself. I am large, I contain multitudes. — Walt Whitman, Song of Myself

I’ve started checking over the new Salon blogs, particularily Scott Rosenberg’s site, and I’m incredibly impressed at the level of discourse there. I have seen many kinds of blogs, but I’ve never really found a site I’ve liked as a starting point for blog discussions until now.

The most important problem is the age-old problem of “information overload.” I’ve generally been able to avoid this problem as I shy away from traditional media and television news and focus primarily on web and magazine journalism, the web for its tendancy to break new ground and new ideas months before the old media picks up on it, and the mags for their interesting in-depth reports on issues I wouldn’t otherwise see.

Salon is the best blend of these two things, and with Salon’s blogs as a starting point I’m finding myself increasingly without time to do all of the reading I’d like to. It used to be that information overload was about trying to process what you took in and paring it down to the important bits — now there is so much useful and important and well-thought out information and opinion that its very hard to manage. I feel like I’m missing out every day I don’t check in with all of my cyber friends.

When blogging was in the hundreds it was fringe, it the thousands it was a curiosity, in the hundreds of thousands it is becoming an overload, and in the millions I don’t know what we will do. There are only so many stories you can read, and only so many you will want to spend time on. And with so much churn there will inevitably be more and more and more rehashing of previously discussed ideas.

Scott Rosenberg snaps at the New York Times to picking up on a story his magazine covered months ago. I feel like we are increasingly backtracking and covering the same ground over and over and over. I’m sure Google Blog Search is coming, and that’ll probably help, but I dunno…there is so much great new informaton, and there is so much crap that is being recirculated and rebreathed and redigested. A Wiki web is perhaps what we need. A Wiki web combined with Everything and a rating system of Kuro5hin and a trust-metric. What a web that would be…

Perhaps it is a measure of confidence in this day and age. The Orange County delegation to the United States Macabbeah games, this kinda Jewish olympics thing for kids, has decided to not wear the t-shirts that they’ve already purchased and printed. Why? Because they are going on a plane, and there are 40 of them, and the shirts say “JCC” (Jewish Community Center) and, although I’m not certain, probably have a Star of David or some such symbol on them.


We have federalized airport screeners, massive lines, triple ID checks, armed military personnell, bomb-sniffing dogs, the works, and people are still not comfortable traveling on planes. So I guess our security measures, for all their hassle, are not working.


I try to take a more logical view of the thing. The Arab terrorists tend to follow certain patterns, scouting locations, having patience, taking a long time to make sure they get it right. They aren’t prone to random killings, they like doing things that are big. I would not worry about traveling on an airplane over the next year or so. The terrorists are smart enough to know that there are plenty more much less protected targets for them to blow up.


Ya know, we talk about government excess and mismanagement, and I talk about outdated systems and stupid old procedures. My dad tells me about an article he read that examined the FBI mentality, part of which is the idea that “real” cops don’t use computers. With all of this wonderful tracking technology, super-duper spyware, powerful censorware, great snooping and sniffing tools, our government is no good at targeting the people who matter. Is it that they are incompetent? Should I stop worrying about infringements of liberty, and instead worry about how crappy our spy agencies are?


Or perhaps I should look to the failed war on drugs and other initiatives with no clear goals or aims but to use huge amounts of money to make the public feel warm and fuzzy. For how much I hate the idea of running the government like a for-profit enterprise, I seem to keep finding myself agreeing with those people who think that we need real accountability, and perhaps the best way of getting it is through a true free-market approach. As in, no sweet deals, no politics, just results.