… “People are treating the Web like a library and going to the card catalog rather than searching through all the books,”
…”After a while you get tired of flipping through the channels and just turn to the programs you like,” he said.
Read the rest over at Yahoo!.
Semi-related: Clay Shirky’s Power Laws, Weblogs, and Inequality, Dave Winer’s and Shelley Powers’s. responses. Shelley’s post is home to a great conversation and I highly recommend it. Jason Kottke adds some good linkage as well.
Birds of a feather flock virtually together, that’s what I always say 🙂
In the end, I think Mark Pilgrim says it best, “All the friendships I?ve developed in the past 2 years?starting long before I was in the Technorati Top 10?grew out of connections I made through writing this weblog and reading others. This month I?ll get 1 million hits on my weblog, and have lunch with 10 friends I met through my weblog. Guess which I care about more.”
Well damn straight.
Chloe in a related BlogRoots thread says,
“What I wonder is why this is being treated as “news”…I’ve noticed this pattern in society from the time I started pre-school.”
Yep, she’s absolutely right. This isn’t news. It’s the same old news. In fact – I wrote a piece, some may recall, a long, long, long time ago, about the power of the link and how some weblogs actually wield more “power” then others. This is old news. If I posted about it – it must be old news!
Information technology usually doesn’t change what we do – just how we do it.
A question though – without idealists like Shelley and Dave (even if they are in the top 20) – would we end up with, instead of an 80/20 “power” (we need a better word) distribution, a 95/5? Think about it. And the play goes on…
Update: They are having a good debate at Slashdot on the Clay Shirky piece.
I’m a little confused as to what people’s motivation is – behind arguing or denying that “power laws” theory.
Like why argue it?
And why every time someone says something about blogs, there’s always a couple of choice people who argue whatever’s said, always.
The thing is, that most of these “top blogs” that apparently get most of this traffic & noteriety… I don’t visit, don’t even like, or don’t have any interest in.
Mostly because the “top blogs” are what I call “hot-button blogs” (either heavily focused on sex or heavily focused on political hot topics), technology blogs, or blogger social gossip blogs (where it’s all about who’s saying what on their blog, & what someone else is up to).
I even stopped visiting BoingBoing since it turned really heavy on the porn related links, though to be honest, I was already losing faith there.
And generally, very rare is the blog I add to my personal links page. I generally visit blogs on the basis of interest in a particular post topic (like this one here), rather than visiting a lot of blogs regularly.
But maybe I AM “unique” as far as bloggers go. 😉
Hi Chloe,
I think more of us are doing the same as you are. Shelley says that in her response and I’m starting to do that more and more too. Slowly but surely I’m stripping away the bigger weblogs from my blogroll so that I can throw traffic to some newcomers.
I think many argue about this subject (and many others having to do with weblogging) since so many webloggers are idealists. Get a few idealists together and you’re bound to have a heated discussion 🙂
I gotta admit – I’m one too – I try and fight my tendencies – but lose sometimes 🙂
What’s the topic that brings you back to my little corner of the web?
I was never much into the blog scene. I generally read blogs of people whom I know personally. It helps me keep up with whats going on in their lives. But every now and then I do hop over to other blogs, to see what people are thinking.
I think I have to agree with Chloe on some points she made. More and more, it seems the majority of the scene is about a social standing and who can attract the most traffic. By putting sexual content on their sites, it sort of tricks the people into getting on there. What bothers me most however, are the one-sided discussions that go on in most of these blogs. A difference of opinion is usually struck down by the owner and thus the blog for the owners becomes a litter box for them and their minions.
As for why I come here – not only is karl a friend, but he actually posts intelligent things here that are food for thought.
Hi Steve 🙂
Thanks man. I hope I made clear that I agree with Chloe too 🙂
There are sooo many ways of looking at weblogging that it’s easy to argue ourselves into a circle sometimes.
Karl’s question: “What’s the topic that brings you back to my little corner of the web?”
Your URL in my site referrals, and I was checking the link to your site from my weblog. 😉
That’s what brought me back. haha.
What brought me here in the first place was this post of yours, about this topic.
I would like to take this opportunity too, to ammend or possibly correct myself, as I was quoted from my comment on Blogroots.
I said pre-school, but I should’ve said it really became obvious in kindergarten, and especially the 1st grade. 😉
You see, when I was in grade school, for the first 4-5 years, there was this situation that caused me much grief.
For some reason, me and this other girl, Kimberly (who I haven’t seen since the late 70s), quickly became the “ring leaders” (that’s what the adults called us) in our class in a small elementary school.
Fight it as I may, it became a situation where the other little kids were EITHER her friend OR mine. I always blamed Kimberly for being a control freak (I think I called it “bully-like” or something at the time ;), vindictive, & not “team spirited”. Later I thought maybe I was somehow also at fault… Maybe I was the control freak and she was just reacting to it vindictively.
But now I’m starting to think maybe both of us, on some level, were merely victims of this power law phenomenon!
Of course, I think of…
“It’s difficult to see the picture when you’re inside the frame.”
😉
Chloe,
I think we are all victims of the “power law.” Basically, very few to damn near none of us can handle power. Even the smallest bit of power consumes us and makes us think we are more special than any other existence in the universe. What makes it all worse, is power is usually obtained rather than given – and it takes an asshole to get to the top. So not only is the person or people at the top consumed by their power, but they are already assholes to being with, thus don’t care who they hurt or piss off.
I think this whole being consumed by power thing is pretty evident by looking at many blogs. People have a false sense of superiority in their little world on the Net. Don’t beleive me? Go check it out at some blogs, disagree and you will see one of two things – a) if you disgree and post your real email address, you will see backlash b)disagree and post anonymously and the post will be canned.
But Steve… When I was a little kid, I swear I wasn’t an asshole. I didn’t want the position that had developed. I really did want everyone to just get along. I felt like the other kids were either with me, backing me, or calling me weird. It was a very uncomfortable place to be. And I DID care about others’ feelings.
So what I’m saying is that maybe that’s how it is for a lot of people … though as an adult, even if you step ass-backwards into something, you should be able to get a better grip on it.
BTW Steve… You’re not doing yourself or anyone else any good harping on the propensity of some cliques’ to engage in ridiculous & annoying behaviours.
There will always be people who feel the need to be mean & nasty to other people in order to make themselves feel adequate. And there will always be “mob mentalities” that develop in certain situations.
Steve wrote: “Don’t beleive me? Go check it out at some blogs, disagree and you will see…”
Steve, I don’t “check out” *those* blogs, because, quite frankly, they’re beneath me.
I have a very full & busy life. There are so many people in the world, so many things to be involved in, and so so many blogs…
I just don’t have the time for baby games or juvenile horseplay, harrassment, racist ire, religious extremism, bigotry, ad hominum attacks or name calling, arguments riddled with logical fallacies, vicious attacks, unfair generalizations, war rhetoric, hate rhetoric, threats, or anyone who gets themselves worked up into a fury apparently “for fun”.
Because “there is no way to peace, pease IS the way”, and I can’t live happily with turmoil in my personal life when there’s so much of it that needs diffusing in the world as a whole.
My advice to you is that you stay the hell away from blogs like you’re talking about if you want peace in your life. Some people thrive on that kind of hostility. If you’re complaining about them, then obviously you’re not one of those people who thrive on it. So you have no business visiting those blogs, in my opinion. Just leave them be. A handful of extremist blogs really mean nothing in the grand scheme of things. I have a wide & varied social circle, and 99% of my friends and acquaintances IN MY “REAL LIFE” have NO CLUE who even the most popular bloggers are, from Adam. Believe me, your blog, my blog, their blogs, they’re all insignificant when it comes to matters important – so you don’t have to police them so they don’t take over the world. 😉 Just drop them off your bookmark list like they have a disease. 😉
Oh, I am not even talking about the “extreme” blogs. I am talking about the trendy traffic sites. Cliques. I am talking about average folks carving a niche out on the Net saying “come on in” and then whispering under their breathe “as long as you think like me.” The extreme blogs, I avoid all together. These ones I am talking about, I have experienced them, and now too, avoid them, but it still exists as what I consider dirty litter boxes on the Net. Every now and again, a topic arises that allows me to voice my distaste for them.
Call me a net snob or an “old head” because I have been around on the Net since the early 80’s, i watched the NFS change the rules to allow commercial use of their backbone, I watched the boom, and in the past couple of years, people have hopped on, with little to no experience and ignorance to the history of the Net with attitudes that because they spend their $9 a year to register their domain name, that they think they own the Net.
Point is, if they want to beat their chests but don’t want anyone to oppsoe them, fine, put a logon on your web site and invite the minions, otherwise, if you leave it for anyone to come to, then be prepared to have all kinds of views.
No offense steve, but I do kinda reserve the right to pull comments. I havn’t had to yet – but I would shut down a thread if I found it counterproductive to good conversation. That sucks I know 🙁
The great thing about this subject is – you’re both right!
It all depends on what counter=productive is. If it is a bunch of name calling and what not, fine. But, htere are many blogs out there where a well thought out and educated opposing view was made on a topic, and it gets pulled. Of course, every blog owner reserves that right to pull it, but if they do, it retracts from the free flow of information. It is no different than getting a one-sided view of news from our main stream media – the very thing blogs and alternative news sources claim they are against.
Steve, I was talking about cliquish blogs too, not just the extreme ones.
“the very thing blogs and alternative news sources claim they are against.”
I agree with this whole-heartedly. And you’re right to point that out. BUT, on the other hand, I think it’s not all that productive to try & “police” them. It goes nowhere. The best combatant against that kind of askew mob mentality is to have your own blog, and keep things real on it.
But I totally agree, that a lot of these bloggers are hypocrites. OR NO, I’m not sure it’s the BLOGGERS who are hypocrites, or the people who read them… Like maybe it’s not the bloggers that are claiming to be non-mainstream news… maybe it’s the fans.
For example, I know everybody raved about that one guy who does a blog (I don’t want to say the name because I have a couple of names floating in my head and I don’t know which one is which – haha)… But anyway, I know people rave about how non-slanted his blog is for news & topics and whatnot. (Though I totally don’t agree with that, I think he’s at least as slanted as the average mainstream media…) And he’s oh-so-policing the mainstream media supposedly. (I’ve heard he has done that in certain instances, and I think that’s good, but I go into hero worship over it.) Anyway, now I heard he has a blog on msnbc or something. Isn’t THAT mainstream media? And are people *still* saying they like him because he’s “for real” and not mainstream media? Because I think you can’t say that about someone who’s doing that, can you? I mean, how about now?
I think once you’re blogging for anything but because you want to… that gives you an undeniable slant. Once you’re getting paid, or once you’re concerned & work on building & keeping an audience… it’s all over, you can’t be truly “real”, in my opinion.
OOPS – use the preview!
I meant to say “I DON’T go into hero worship…”
hahahaha.
I figured that is what you meant. 🙂
What I find very funny is all media is one-sided unless it is an open forum discussion. Fox, ms-nbc, cnn, etc. are all one-sided (they throw a bone every now and again with shows such as talkback live but for the most part, they are very one-sided). Even such mediums as alternative news sources are one-sided unless it is an open-ened discussion. This doesn’t exist in enough places. Nor, do I think it can exist. That is why I try to make it a point to check other sides to stories (even try to get arabic vantage points on the whole crisis). So getting different sides to different stories educates me more on a topic. No one blog or one news site will do that of course.
Just the whole idea of open-ended discussions gives a story a whole new meaning because you can get the view points of a very diverse population. When blog owners strike down those types of discussions because “it disagrees with their side”, sure it is their right and I respect that, but it doesn’t make it right nor does it promotoe and encourage free discussion. Yes, if I don’t like it, I can leave, and I do – but is that beneficial to the flow and diversity of information?
steve: “Yes, if I don’t like it, I can leave, and I do – but is that beneficial to the flow and diversity of information?”
When people aren’t interested in real diversity of information, yeah, it’s beneficial to leave, I think. Why give them the attention, after all. And why frustrate yourself?
And yeah, every blog is going to be slanted in various ways.
For example, NEPABlog.com has it SPECIFICALLY in the Blogger guidelines that there should be no hostility or discriminating remarks made about people of opposing political views. For example, it’s okay to for a blogger to express their opinion on an issue… but it’s not okay for a blogger to make remarks like “Right wingers suck” or “Liberals are stupid” or “Republicans are sheep and that’s why you think that!” Or other alienating remarks such as “The problem with the area is that the corrupt Democrats hold too much power.” – YOu can say you think a particular Democrat is corrupt, of course… And I think most people know the difference between these.
However, even so, if you visit the blog, you’ll definitely get the impression it’s a “liberal” blog just because it has a lot of posts regarding local peace vigils & anti-war protest events & such. And one blogger posts stuff about animal issues (which is traditionally a liberal thing, I guess).
There is one self-described Republican blogger. But she doesn’t post much. I even encouraged her to post about Bush’s visit to our area. I felt I wasn’t in a position to do it fairly, myself, so I didn’t post about it at all. But I can’t MAKE her post about it! And we can’t MAKE Republicans sign up to blog.
Thus, the blog winds up looking pretty left-wing.
There’s nothing wrong with that, of course.
ANd if someone said they felt alienated because they’re a conservative there, I *would* actually be interested in improving the fairness if they had an idea.
But hey, there’s blogs like “Right Wing News”… now that site is pretty much outright admitting that it’s slanted. haha.