The Great Seduction

Etes-vous elitiste?

The French have discovered CULT. "Etes-vous elitiste?" I was asked by Les Echos, the French version of the Financial Times. I've even been christened "l'Anti-christ de la Silicon Valley" by Liberation, the French leftist daily. Both articles are actually very intelligent and reflect a growing interest in my work in continental Europe. I just accepted an invitation to speak at LeWeb3 in Paris in December. I'll be speaking at the Crossmedia Picnic event in late September. And I'll be keynoting a number of other events in Europe in the Fall including the International Association of Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishers in Frankfurt in October and Online Educa Berlin in late November.

In real life, of course, I'm neither un elitiste nor l'antichrist.  Want proof? Come and hear me talk. I'll actually be in Europe all of next week, lecturing about the future of media, culture and technology:

09/04   Royal Society for the Arts, London (6.00 pm)
09/05   Toward a Social Science of Web 2.0, University of York  (6.00 pm) -- in debate with Charles      
            Leadbeater, one of the UK's most distinguished digital optimists.
09/06   Frontline Club, London (7.30 pm) -- introduced by Richard Sambrooke, director of BBC's Global
            News
09/07   IJP Alumni Conference, Bonn (noon)
09/07   Watershed Media Center, 25th Anniversary Celebration, Bristol (7.00 pm) -- in conversation with
            filmmaker Ana Kronschnabl and writer/director Hazel Grian.

The devil wears Hermes and is a blogger

What is the connection between the fashion industry and the Internet? Both, it would seem, are being transformed by a radical democratization which is undermining real quality and enriching smart marketing companies.  Just as "democratization" of media is undermining the value of high quality news reporting, so the "democratization" of fashion is undermining the value of style.

In Wednesday's NY Times, Michiko Kakutani reviews How Luxury Lost its Lustre, a fascinating new book by Newsweek fashion correspondent Dana Thomas. It seems like the fashion business is experiencing a similar dumbing down of quality to the Internet. Kakutani describes this as a "shift from exclusivity to accessibility, from an emphasis on tradition and quality to an emphasis on growth and branding and profits." She goes on:

But her focus remains on how a business that once catered to the wealthy elite has gone mass-market and the effects that democratization has had on the way ordinary people shop today, as conspicuous consumption and wretched excess have spread around the world. Labels, once discreetly stitched into couture clothes, have become logos adorning everything from baseball hats to supersized gold chains. Perfumes, once dreamed up by designers with an idea about a particular scent, are now concocted from briefs written by marketing executives brandishing polls and surveys and sales figures.

There are all sorts of parallels between the contemporary history of media and fashion. Both are seducing all of us. Wearing Hermes makes us feel exclusive; authoring a blog makes us feel powerful. But the consequence of each is the stripping away of quality. As Dana Thomas argues:

“The luxury industry has changed the way people dress. It has realigned our economic class system. It has changed the way we interact with others. It has become part of our social fabric. To achieve this, it has sacrificed its integrity, undermined its products, tarnished its history and hoodwinked its consumers. In order to make luxury ‘accessible,’ tycoons have stripped away all that has made it special. Luxury has lost its luster.”

Replace "luxury" with "truth" and you've could be describing the blogosphere:

In order to make truth ‘accessible,’ the Internet has stripped away all that has made it special. Truth has lost its luster.

 

We are all digital Hitlers now

No sooner than I wondered aloud if I was a Nazi, I read about Godwin's Law in today's New York Times. The Godwin in Godwin's Law is Mike Godwin, the General Council of the Wikipedia Foundation. And Godwin has authored the most brilliant insight into the logical conclusion of all Internet chat:

“As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approach one."

In other words, it is inevitable that, at some point or another in an online discussion, somebody will accuse somebody else of being a Nazi. That's how the Internet is refining our intellects. When you don't agree with somebody in an online discussion, call them Hitler. Even I -- the ultimate digital sceptic -- prove Godwin's Law (by accusing myself of being a Nazi).

But Godwin, as the general council of the Wikipedia Foundation, isn't too bothered about his own law. As he told the New York Times:

“In another 25 years, all of our children will have grown up in a world in which media like these are mutable and changeable and people prank each other, and it will seem less important. Part of my job is to prevent restrictive rules from being put in place that prevent people from participating in massively democratic participatory media. And then let the new norms settle.”

So, if "massively democratic participatory media" ultimate ends up in National Socialist insults, what's its point? How are we to stop online discussions terminating in Nazi name-calling? And what evidence does Godwin have that we are becoming more tolerant of online pranksters? (the reverse might actually be true, judging from most of the humorless apres Colbert comments on my anti-blog blog).

Am I Nazi?

And so I got Truthified by Colbert. First of all, the Truthificator got me to confess publicly, in front of Colbert-nation, that I'm an elitist. Then he got me to acknowledge that the Internets (sic) is worse than the Nazis.

But Colbert didn't take the next  logical step that would have revealed my real identity.  The grand Truthpoobah failed to ask me the all-important question, the one that would have the most appalling truth about me. If I'm an elitist and the Internets (sic) is worse than the Nazis, then doesn't that make me a full-blown National Socialist -- maybe a senior level SS officer or even a member of the Fuhrer's inner circle, an anti digital Goebbels or Himmler?

So am I really a Nazi?

I'm not saying -- not here, not on a sad little blog (even if it's my own sad little blog). But if Colbert has me onto his show again, I'll tell him. He can ask me anything; I'll confess all to the Truthmonster.

What a pathetically ingratiating way to worm another invitation onto the Colbert Report, eh?

And in such poor taste.

Walloped by Emily

I've finally been nailed. Till now, I think I've come out at least even in all my debates with Web 2.0 boyz like Chris Anderson, Kevin Kelly and David Weinberger. But all good things come to an end. I've finally been outdebated. By a lady -- and an English lady at that.

In my Guardian newspaper debate with Guardian Unlimited's digital supremo Emily Bell, she outwitted me and then took me to the cleaners. My hunch is that I went in a bit cocky, stuck out my chin and got a good walloping. She's a tough bird, that Emily Bell. I'm not debating her again.

Speaking of being outwitted and taken to the cleaners, I'm appearing on the Colbert Report this Thursday (8/16). So those of you who want to see me get the mother of wallopings should tune in then. No doubt he'll make me the central comedy on Comedy Central (serves me right for idealizing mainstream media).

Anyone have any advice about how to outwit the great Stephen Colbert?

An authentic luddite vacation

Even a disgraceful fascist luddite communist control freak monarchist failed dotcom entrepreneur like myself needs to take a vacation. So I'm off to Berkeley's legendary Tuolumne family camp tomorrow. It's a mini Berkeley in the Sierra's and -- with no email, phone or electricity -- an idyllic place for me to be an authentically disgraceful luddite for a few blissful days.

What to do without email? In addition to entertaining wives (just one, in fact) and children, there's always multiple books -- which can be read in the sunshine during the day and by candlelight at night. Here's my reading list for Tuolumne this year:

Hanna Arendt, Between Past and Future (particularly her essay "What is Authority" -- lovely new Penguin edition, btw)

Simon Head, The New Ruthless Economy (I just read Head''s excellent essay "They are micromanaging your every move" in the latest New York Review of Books).

Eugene Kennedy and Sara Charles, Authority (I just read Richard Sennett's slightly disappointing Authority -- I'm currently reading everything about authority that I can get my hands on)

Gunter Grass, Peeling the Onion (I also just read Timothy Garton Ash's amazing "The Road to Danzig" in the latest New York Review)

Brian Doherty, Radicals for Capitalism (I've got to get a more concrete historical grasp of libertarianism)

Does anyone have any other good suggestions for interesting books on either authority or libertarianism?