Re: [PEN-L] Ward Churchill liberal lynch mob
Greetings Economists, LP writes, The blog has emerged as an important Internet medium. Unlike the more horizontally oriented mailing list (let alone the anarchistically free-for-all usenet), the blog is essentially a vertical medium. Some personality with a bit of name recognition will set up a blog and hold forth on various topics. and LP writes, Perhaps the most open recognition of this goal is the aptly named Max Speak, You Listen, the blog of Max Sawicky, an economist at EPI. Doyle, I think LP is not accurately describing the information generating properties of blogs. Since LP brought up Max's blog one might ask why Max's blog is growing a stronger voice than say Pen-L? First of all I think the description about horizontally oriented mailing lists and vertical lists of blogs is not a deep enough analysis of the two types of communication. Especially the parallel with academics seems to me to not capture the production process. With the Maxspeak blog the relative content of Max's content is substantially more complex and in depth than the average Pen-L commentary. The chart references and commentary are much more in depth. Now it's true that it's lead by Max, but comments are as often at least as thoughtful as Pen-L comments. On the main in fact there seems to be a relationship between the personal connection of the readers to a specific voice that encourages a stronger voice in the comments and deeper tie in the readers. Maxspeak also runs into the problem that blogs have not solved. With 8000 unique visitors per day the connection between Max and community is at best tenuous. The remoteness of the blogger's role to their audience is directly related to how much a blogger can actually respond to the whole audience the upper bound for a really active social butterfly being about 1 or 2 thousand unique visitors. That's really the issue about horizontal and vertical issues arise. The connection process of blogs is very primitive. For example I'll point to the main collaborator on Maxspeak, the Sandwich Man. Max referred to him as his Ed McMahon. Which I wonder about how much true horizontal relationship they feel for each other. It sounds unequal. Probably that just means they are ignoring the problem of the connection process more than their politics is arrogant and unfeeling. However they usually write their own piece with little or nothing seemingly shared. The connection process reflects something like this. A child learns the accents and language of their parents. That is a collaborative connection process. The parent role is often authoritative, but children demand a lot of parents. It may be unequal in some ways but the flow back and forth in creating a common connection is quite powerful. So it goes with friendships and sexual partners as well. In a text based site like Maxspeak one could say that the two of them could work on a single published essay, but the two of them usually don't do that. One could easily imagine collaborating on single document. The old Sid Caesar show where comedy writers sat together and threw out ideas for the weekly show and someone collected the jokes and sewed them together is good live version of collaboration. I also think LP ignores the asynchronous nature of mail lists and blogs. Unlike real time conversation the capacity to add content depth through asynchrony makes a significant difference to the academic example LP reaches for. I think the analogy with academia is faulty and the analysis that refers to horizontal and vertical organization of information is too superficial. One could easily imagine in a technical sense through P2P techniques doing what Max does, and utilizing the closer emotional ties that his blog engenders to build a left strong organization of a new type. I think Max is a pioneer of a direction in left thought. Primarily in the easy touch with humor and analytical depth. I don't think Max has mastered collaboration or the theory of it. Also Sandwichman is not well showcased for his virtues in Maxspeak. These weaknesses of the concept over time will be addressed by new teams that have more of focus on collaboration processes. But the example comparing the Maxspeak weblog with Pen-L gives a sense of how to think about the left on the internet that is well worth considering. Not in the sense that LP says of horizontal and vertical but greater connection between audience and the left talker. thanks, Doyle
Re: [PEN-L] Ward Churchill liberal lynch mob
Julio Huato wrote: If the real source of the campaign against Ward Churchill and M. Shahid Alam is the right wing establishment (with the tacit encouragement or at least silent tolerance of the White House), then why on earth should we focus our attacks on the liberals? Because: (1) the point of politics is to draw lines between liberals/the soft left and real revolutionaries, and always make sure you're on the latter side of the divide, and (2) attacking the right would interfere with (1), forcing you to concede that reactionaries are a big problem, and that maybe there are degrees of evil after all, and (3) some people are stuck in a past when there was real revolutionary potential around and liberals did represent a threat of co-optation or betrayal, and they haven't noticed yet that three rather eventful decades have passed and the position of liberals is rather different when there are bellicose theocrats in the White House. Doug
Re: [PEN-L] Ward Churchill liberal lynch mob
I plead guilty to self-centeredness. My job and avocation is to disseminate my own writing. I don't know how many people sub to this list, nor how many within that number read my posts, as opposed to delete on site, but my daily readership on my own site now is up to about 8,000 a day (unique visitors). So I'm reaching more that way than I ever could on PEN-L. Also making a bit of money. Plus one's own blog has no volume constraint, in contrast to a listserv. Also meeting new people. I got one comment signed Cate Blanchett that said: I want to have your hairy communist offspring. The advantages are obvious. As to comments, I have a lively comments section which allows for lengthy replies, including links to whatever, including some pretty stiff criticism of yrs truly. I haven't been braying about Churchill (Ward), though I could uncork many of the same criticisms of him (and Ted Rall) seen elsewhere if I thought it helped the cause of the proletariat. I don't think it does, as I explained on my own site. I don't take umbrage at what Louis wrote or see it as a huge criticism. He is right that this is a new and possibly important medium. I'd like to see more radicals take a shot at it. I'd be happy to help. The more the merrier. Most left-of- center bloggers are not very far left. mbs But the biggest problem is that the blog is analogous to a lecture where the audience is allowed to ask questions or make brief comments after the lecture is finished. In other words, the blogger sets the agenda. It is easy to understand why an academic or a journalist would want to exercise this type of control. After spending years building up a career and reputation, why would you want to operate on the same level as the plebe? Perhaps the most open recognition of this goal is the aptly named Max Speak, You Listen, the blog of Max Sawicky, an economist at EPI.
Re: [PEN-L] Ward Churchill liberal lynch mob - Help Me
In a message dated 2/9/2005 12:10:52 P.M. Central Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: I don't take umbrage at what Louis wrote or see it as a huge criticism. He is right that this is a new and possibly important medium. I'd like to see more radicals take a shot at it. I'd be happy to help. The more the merrier. Most left-of- center bloggers are not very far left. mbs Reply I would love to take you up on this offer and dedicate a blog to left and communist politics with dieting or food consumption and its modern meaning as a pivotal point. Also interested in something with serious critique of popular music. Really. Jerrard - the guy advertising for SubWay sandwiches, says he lost weight by eating fresh and that is not why he lost weight. He lost weight because he stopped eating all the other crap. :-) I have what I believe to be a very clever title for such a blog, which cannot be shared openly. Plus, I desire to cater to more than less conservative communism with something of a Christ communist tinge. Conservative communist of my persuasion believe that the guy with the big house should not be threatened but socially necessary things of survival should be provided by society in the form of a sovereign birth right. Really. Why anyone in America has to pay for water? All the arguments about the cost of maintenance can go straight to hell. Now I do no object to being charged dearly for alligator shoes, if the environmentalist do not win and outlaw my shoes. Then I have a personal beef with General Motors. Twenty five years of bad car designs should qualify them for expropriation due to lack of good taste. Their Snoop Dog Dog Cadillac Truck is to little to late. I am very tried of politically correct people and vocabulary. Ugly people are still ugly even if it is not polite to call them ugly. And fat people need to exercise their arms by pushing themselves away from the table. Below is a good my wife sent to me when we had a disagreement about how many shoes a women should own. I think I was correct is saying that 75 pairs was enough and 100 the absolute limit. The FBI had an opening for an assassin. After all the background checks,interviews, and testing were done, there were three finalists. Two menand a woman. For the final test, the CIA agents took one of the men toa large metal door and handed him a gun.. "We must know that you willfollow your instructions no matter what the circumstances. Inside thisroom, you will find your wife sitting in a chair. Kill Her!!!" The mansaid, "You can't be serious. I could never shoot my wife." The agentsaid, "Then you're not the right man for this job. Take your wife and gohome."The second man was given the same instructions. He took the gun andwent into the room. All was quiet for about five minutes. Then the mancame out with tears in his eyes. "I tried, but I can't kill my wife."The agent said "You don't have what it takes, take your wife and gohome."Finally, it was the woman's turn. She was given the instruction to killher husband. She took the gun and went into the room. Shots were heard,one shot after another. They heard screaming, crashing, banging on thewalls. After a few minutes, all was quiet. The door opened slowly andthere stood the woman. She wiped the sweat from her brow. "This gun isloaded with blanks", she said. "I had to beat him to death with thechair".Moral: Women are evil. Don't mess with them. I think she is trying to tell me something that has nothing to do with the law of value and capital accumulation in the era of fiat money. Waistline
Re: [PEN-L] Ward Churchill liberal lynch mob
Despite Max's guilt -- an no doubt he is guilty of much more serious crimes -- it is best not to make such statements about people on the list, especially when they be easily misconstrued. Max B. Sawicky wrote: I plead guilty to self-centeredness. My job and avocation is to disseminate my own writing. I don't know how many people sub to this list, nor how many within that number read my posts, as opposed to delete on site, but my daily readership on my own site now is up to about 8,000 a day (unique visitors). So I'm reaching more that way than I ever could on PEN-L. Also making a bit of money. Plus one's own blog has no volume constraint, in contrast to a listserv. Also meeting new people. I got one comment signed Cate Blanchett that said: I want to have your hairy communist offspring. The advantages are obvious. As to comments, I have a lively comments section which allows for lengthy replies, including links to whatever, including some pretty stiff criticism of yrs truly. I haven't been braying about Churchill (Ward), though I could uncork many of the same criticisms of him (and Ted Rall) seen elsewhere if I thought it helped the cause of the proletariat. I don't think it does, as I explained on my own site. I don't take umbrage at what Louis wrote or see it as a huge criticism. He is right that this is a new and possibly important medium. I'd like to see more radicals take a shot at it. I'd be happy to help. The more the merrier. Most left-of- center bloggers are not very far left. mbs But the biggest problem is that the blog is analogous to a lecture where the audience is allowed to ask questions or make brief comments after the lecture is finished. In other words, the blogger sets the agenda. It is easy to understand why an academic or a journalist would want to exercise this type of control. After spending years building up a career and reputation, why would you want to operate on the same level as the plebe? Perhaps the most open recognition of this goal is the aptly named Max Speak, You Listen, the blog of Max Sawicky, an economist at EPI. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University michael at ecst.csuchico.edu Chico, CA 95929 530-898-5321 fax 530-898-5901
Re: [PEN-L] Ward Churchill liberal lynch mob
I ain't lookin' to spew on you, Eschew or screw or easily misconstrue you... michael perelman wrote: it is best not to make such statements about people on the list, especially when they be easily misconstrued. __ Post your free ad now! http://personals.yahoo.ca
