thoughts

   After the wedding and the move, things have almost settled down enough to catch up on my usual reading. While I'm still way behind at Contratimes, I've read most of the recent banter by computer-types Paul Graham and Pseudonym Cringley. While the personality differences between these two could be seen in just about any combination of their essays, they both happened to recently talk about globs (my wife coined that word for me so I wouldn't have to say "blawg") while touching on topics related to the Hallowed Mobocracy of the Internet. Check out investor-conscious Cringely's view and compare it to rise-of-the-outcasts Graham's.
   While I've tended to be more of the social oddball than the stock broker type, in this case I side more with Cringely. His view is that for all the hype, the Mobocracy is struggling to prove its worth. Sorry, Mr. Graham: I just don't see how all the silly home videos floating around would conquer Seinfeld or the Simpsons. I don't even see how such arbitrarily-cut, poorly-lit cinematography could compare favorably even to real music videos — corrupt, clueless and cash-laden as the record industry may be. Mr. Graham often has some poignant insights into foibles others overlook, and I'm a little surprised that he would fall for such hype. Perhaps that is a topic for another post...