I Want To Be A Clone
There was a comment by Elisa Camahort on my rant on "young and early adopter" vs. "just young". She wrote a related posting on her blog about "mainstream" as a concept. That actually touched on something that I've thought for a long time.
The internet provides widespread access to people and information like never before. Yet, ironically, one of the biggest uses of that access is to create some of the most homogeneous groups and associations possible. This is great for people who have felt very alone in their niches (I'm not the only one who feels like this, etc.). However, it's also led to some really distorted perceptions about the way things are in society at large. And, like other situations where people surround themselves with people who are virtual clones of themselves, it becomes easy to go from "why am I all alone" to "cool, other people like me" to "isn't it great that *everyone* is getting on board". All the while, the shift wasn't in the actual percentage of the population that was participating, but in the person's shifting social circle.
I think that much of the "blogosphere" is suffering from this right now. The audio from conferences on the topic and on podcasting from San Francisco seemed to just ooze this philosophy. That somehow "everyone" is getting into blogging and podcasting these days. The statistical reality, on the other hand, is that the people saying this have just started hanging out (online and elsewhere) with people who happen to have a blog. Of the people I know primarily offline, including database developers, web developers, etc. I only know of 2 people who have their own personal site. None that I've spoken with in the last 3 months have heard of podcasting.
This isn't to say that these things aren't growing at phenomenal rates. The stats back that up. But, when you consider either the 300 million people in the US or the 6+ billion on the planet, it's still just a drop in the bucket.
September 30th, 2005 at 5:46 am
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out. .
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out. .
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out. .
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out. .
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out. .
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out. .
September 30th, 2005 at 5:46 am
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out. .
September 30th, 2005 at 5:46 am
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out. .
September 30th, 2005 at 5:46 am
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out. .
September 30th, 2005 at 5:46 am
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out. .
September 30th, 2005 at 5:46 am
When regular people who couldn't care less about technology, except about how they can use it, are using it in these ways…then we will be part of the mainstream. And it could be a beautiful thing! UPDATED: J Wynia writes a nice responsive post to this one, on which I couldn't resist further commenting of course. Check it out..
September 26th, 2005 at 10:46 am
Thanks for the link. I agree with much of what you say obviously. I do think it's fair to say that perhaps there are cutting edge people from all walks of life that are getting into this stuff. You can find a blog on just about every subject, from corrugated tin to knitting to NASCAR. The breadth of interests of the early adopters does say something for how fast use of this media will grow, which I guess is why people are investing in the sector in what seems like a bubble-redux fashion. My big caveats are that I think a) people are imagining a far too rapid trajectory of adoption and b) that adoption will never happen if we don't get better tools and services.
September 27th, 2005 at 3:00 pm
Ironically enough, my wife has one of the knitting blogs ( http://fearlessknitting101.com/ ) and she's realizing that although there are quite a few other knitbloggers out there, she really seems to be on the leading edge after only a couple months.
I have my own company blog (link above) and realized that there were huge areas of the software development community missing out on the outlet that blogging is. Therefore I started a group blog called CodeSnipers ( http://CodeSnipers.com/ ) which has managed to connect some of these people.
Will it connect lots of them? Unlikely. Will it connect a few? Definitely.