I do actually like to write. You know: think a bit, put some words down, shuffle them around, and try to put them in front of an audience. I like it a lot. I've even been doing a four day week for the last couple of years and my nearest and dearest have taken the belt tightening so I can spend more time at it.

But that's not how it's working out.

First, work (you know, the stuff that pays the bills) got really busy. Not that there's anything wrong with that. I work with good people and it's interesting in it's own way. I even intermittently Blog for the Man, and if you want to know about writing database applications on mobile devices I can tell you a few things about it. So I'm not complaining. Never mind, I said to myself. These things happen. This too shall pass and then I'll get to do some writing.

Then I went on holiday to England to see the place and my Mum and siblings. Not that there's anything wrong with that either – hello everyone, it was great to see you – but that's my big chunk of time … Continue reading

The filling
station where I worked at weekends was quiet – it’s closed now – and I
often spent much of my shift reading anything from Judge Dredd comics
to the The Worm Ourobouros to the unabridged Count of Monte Cristo –
while using up my pay on sweets and listening to the top 40 countdown
on the transistor radio.

I can’t remember what year it was when Ernie Wise
and his wife Doreen Blythe stopped in to fill up their white Rolls
Royce but I only worked at the filling station in the late ’70s, so I know it was when Morecambe and Wise
were among the most famous faces in the country. Their show was a
weekly family event for us. I doubt if the humour has aged well,
but I know I laughed at the Anthony and Cleopatra
sketch with Glenda Jackson until the pop I was drinking came right out of my
nostrils. 28 million people watching their Christmas specials couldn’t all be wrong.

Of course, I recognized Ernie
Wise as soon … Continue reading

I have been in a sour mood all day, and that is going to spill over into this mean-spirited post. Too bad.

The original reasons for my foul temper had nothing to do with online things or with academia, but then the Internet made it worse.

Reading Carnegie Mellon University’s Cosma Shalizi (excluded from the title) is always enlightening and usually lifts my spirits, but today he points us to a poor article by Chris Anderson, editor of Wired Magazine. I made the mistake of following the link and my sour mood deepened.

Then I see that Anita Elberse of Harvard Business School has actually looked at some data behind the same Chris Anderson’s Long Tail hypothesis (please, don’t call it a theory) and, not surprisingly found it misguided. You would think that would cheer me up, but reading Anderson’s response just (here and reprinted here) plunged me further into gloom. Why? Because although he loses this battle (if asked I will bore people with the details, but I really don’t think there is a point), sloppy … Continue reading

I am excited to announce that I am finally ready to write my next book.
It's going to be great. And here's the best thing of all: you can help me write it!

It's about the Internet and how it's changing
the world. I've got the outline done and I was just thinking I need a research
assistant to fill in the details. Then I thought – well, why just one?
There are a million research assistants out there – let's crowdsource!

Any book about the Internet needs a big idea. Not just a
kind-of-big idea either, but a Great-Big-Fuck-Off-Massive Idea. The kind of idea
that is so big you can't get your head round it, and yet which you can put in a short phrase so you can trademark it. My Idea is that there are now more ideas in the world than ever before.
What's more, these ideas are not just stuck
inside people's heads doing nothing, but thanks to the Internet everyone is putting their
ideas out there for the world to see. And then these ideas spark other
ideas. So with more ideas … Continue reading

Number one in a series of, well, probably one. Nevertheless, makes yer fink, no?

From The Oil Drum.

The comments thread on the post at the Oil Drum is, to someone who never thinks about the wonders of cement, mind boggling. Did you know that there are 7-level residential high rises in Yemen made from mud-brick that have lasted for 500 years? Neither did I.

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Imagine a society where everyone gets the same income. Then the income of one quarter of the population suddenly increases by a factor of five while the income of the other three quarters stays the same. How would we compare the society before and after this jolt of riches? Here are some common reactions:

• The average income has doubled. The new world is better than the old.
• Most people in the society have seen no change. The new world is not really different from the old world.
• There is increased inequality. The new world will be marked by unequal access to power and by failing democratic institutions. The new world is worse than the old.
• … and on and on. You know the drill.

The standard positions have been hashed out ad nauseam, but two recent op-eds in the New York Times prompt this challenge: Avoid using the words "on average" in your reaction to the stories they tell – no matter how tempting you find it.

The first op-ed was back in February by Michael Cox and Richard Alm, and was called Continue reading