Friday, June 15, 2001

EMPTY TROUGH: Feed and Suck went on "indefinite hiatus" last Friday. I miss both of 'em, but particularly Feed.

Run by Steven Johnson, one of the early gurus and advocates of web publishing, Feed had a novel format combining a single online column by various contributors ("Feed Daily") with feature-section packages taking longer and broader looks at meta-themes such as politics, the environment, and literature.

What's more, Feed had the novelty of coming from NYC, not Frisco, which helped it maintain a healthy distance from the more annoying aspects of cyber-hype. (Suck sneered at the cyber-hype but still imagined it to be important enough to sneer at.)

OTHER VOICES (William Arnold, in his P-I review of the Tomb Raider movie): " ...It's also scary to keep reading (even in my own newspaper) how Lara Croft is such a wonderful new feminist role model for young women. We're talking here about a sadistic egotist who greedily vandalizes the cultural monuments of the Third World and embodies the spirit of Columbine. A role model? God help us all."

ELSEWHERE:

Devo action figures! Every home should have a complete set! (found by Slumberland)....

What if they gave an Internet content creators' convention and nobody came?...

Sympathy for the record industry?...

posted by clark 11:13 AM

Thursday, June 14, 2001

EXQUISITE CORP.S?: Dave Winer's long-running (in Net-years) DaveNet column recently suggested a "corporate death penalty," the government-mandated dissolving of companies found guilty of major offenses.

"For example," Winer writes, "I would have put Exxon to death for the Valdez disaster, to set an example for other would-be rapers of the environment."

Winer has yet to detail how this might be carried out (government seizure and auction of assets, perhaps?). But he has suggested it'd be the ideal answer to the Microsoft monopoly. Instead of splitting MS up into two firms, "after the death penalty, there would be zero Microsofts, not two."

There's a precedent for this in Britain, under the old tradition of crown-chartered corporations (such as the still-extant Hudson's Bay Co.) existing on the government's bidding and subject to periodic review and non-automatic renewal.

The modern-day example of this is Britain's oldest commercial TV network, ITV. As I oh-so-briefly explained recently, ITV was devised as a loose consortium of local stations, with no central corporate management save for the heavy hand of their government regulator, originally known as the Independent Television Authority (ITA). The ITA built and ran the transmitters, then contracted out the programming and ad sales on these stations to 15 different companies. The contracts were for limited terms (four to eight years) and their renewal was not automatic. The ITA would re-hire, fire, or force mergers among contractor companies for any combination of reasons, from financial solvency to programming priorities. Thus major operators such as ATV/ITC (producers of The Prisoner and The Muppet Show), Associated British Corp. (The Avengers), Rediffusion (Ready Steady Go!), and Thames Television (The Benny Hill Show) have come and gone from the ITV airwaves over the years.

Of course the US has always had a more libertarian attitude toward the sacred rights of business than the pre-Thatcher UK. Today's American regulatory system luuuvs gigantic media conglomerates and other global business giants. To even put teeth back into US business oversight (let alone fangs) would require a far bigger change in Congress than one centrist Republican turning into a centrist Democrat.

(This article's permanent link)

posted by clark 12:27 PM

Wednesday, June 13, 2001

CLOSING THE BOOK ON AN ERA: I miss the old downtown Seattle library already.

Granted, it was far more blase than the Carnegie-era palace it had replaced in 1959 (of which, of course, I've seen only exterior photos). And, granted, it was a severely rotting work of slipshod "modern" construction, a relic of the same budget-conscious administration that gave us the also-slowly-collapsing current city hall.

But it was also a relic of the same jet-age optimism that gave us the '62 World's Fair. It abounded with "clean" lines, tall ceilings, and a populistic openness of space.

And as of last Friday, it's closed and will soon be demolished. The temporary library in the new part of the Convention Center (closer to my home but still just a rental) won't open for a month. 'Til then, the self-researching investment gurus, Mormon geneologists, and homeless folks looking for a temporary indoor sitting space are outta luck.

ON OTHER SITES:

"The opposite of smooth is sexual...."

"Why e-business needs feminine energy...."

Art photos, old catfight-fetish paperback covers, and 1957 cocktail-party invvitations are just some of the tasteful attractions at Art and Leisure....

posted by clark 12:42 AM

Monday, June 11, 2001

Seattle Times publisher Frank Blethen has a job that typically dictates civic boosting, the hyping of his own city's attractiveness as a place to live, work, and conduct trade. He's now apparently shirking from his professional duties.

The newspaper trade journal Editor & Publisher quotes Blethen as threatening to move all the paper's operations out to Bothell, except for a small news bureau and ad-sales office. Blethen blathered about the usual gripes corporate bosses itching for government subsidies gripe about, from zoning to traffic to insufficiently submissive politicians. He even invoked the right-wing buzzwords "ultra liberal" and "pro-labor" to bash Mayor Paul Schell.

Schell is no real liberal, let alone an "ultra" one (what is an "ultra liberal," anyway? Someone who wants to smash the state but keep the Post Office?).

But Schell refused to be interviewed by Times scab reporters during last winter's strike. This may be the real reason for Blethen's blast.

Without specifically endorsing the candidacy of the much-hated Mark Sidran (who loves to use the "ultra liberal" expression himself), and by speaking for himself as a businessman rather than settling for his paper's editorial pages, Blethen may be thinking he can do his part to oust Schell and bring Seattle's city government even further into line with the corporate-boot-licking norm of so many governments across today's western world.

Of course, all he may really end up doing is pissing off even more local citizens than he managed to piss off with his obstinate attitude during and after the strike.

(This article's permanent link)

posted by clark 11:32 PM

Sunday, June 10, 2001

OUR FREQUENT GUEST COLUMNIST CHARLOTTE QUINN offers an amusing little piece speculating about the future advertising uses of today's pop-song hits (Viagra jokes included, but of course). It's at this permanent link.

IN THE WAKE of the dead-dot-com tracking site FuckedCompany, there's now FuckedWeblog to track personal content sites whose creators have found better uses for their time.

posted by clark 10:13 PM

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