From: Chuck Murcko (chuck@topsail.org)
Date: Tue May 08 2001 - 12:02:08 PDT
On Tuesday, May 8, 2001, at 01:51 PM, Tom wrote:
> The silly thing is LETTING the media control the hierarchy. If the ways
> and means of the brand new jimmie is simply aping what was done before
> it
> then why would I be interested in it any more than I am with the old
> ways
> and means?
>
> In short, if you NEED the media to make your leaders for ya, then start
> the Celine Dion soundtracks and grab a life raft.
>
I don't think it was a need at all. I think it happened because there
was no need, other than for OS projects to get themselves organized a
bit as they grew. In the vacuum, when the media discovered open source,
*they* had a need to find some people who were the pundits and leaders
on this stuff. Same as the net, which has always functioned just fine
without the media. Boom! Cliff Stoll on TV.
It would have been silly if it was *planned* that way. Sans plan, it
just happened that way.
Open source and free software have always resembled a group of tribes
more than anything else I can think of. Or the world's largest anarchy.
Or both.
> I have never thought I needed the media to tell me what to think, when
> to
> think it, and who to look to for leadership. I was of the mind maybe we
> had outgrown that heroin sick junk habit.
>
Whether you or I buy what the media sells isn't the point; it's whether
J. Random TechMediaConsumer buys it. That's whose perception of open
source is shaped by the coverage, the folks who aren't close enough to
it to know any better than what they see or read.
> If you want pure enteraintment there are better more media savy
> venues. I
> would suggest the Fashion INdustry, POp Music and the Opra's Book of the
> Month Club. They got it down in ways the OS ehores are still figuring
> out.
>
8^) Yeah, but they're entertaining even if they haven't made it to Vegas
yet.
>
> At the record company meeting On their hands - a dead star and ooh, the
> plans that they weave and ooh, the sickening greed At the record company
> party on their hands - a dead star the sycophantic slags all say: "I
> knew
> him first, and I knew him well" Re-issue! Re-package! Re-package!
> Re-evaluate the songs double pack with a photograph Extra Track (and a
> tacky badge)--THe Smiths
>
>
We'll see. I don't think the story turns out this way, though. The media
spotlight will move on, and we'll get back to building stuff, the
pundits will fade, and the software industry will be altered
permanently, I think.
Chuck Murcko
Topsail Group
http://www.topsail.org/
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