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May 28, 2006

Web What.dot.ever

I hadn't been able to put my finger on what has aggravated me so much about the phrase "Web 2.0". But the May 26 posting on Boing Boing by Cory Doctorow nailed it.

Usually, the nature of my annoyance with phrases like that is easy to pinpoint: namely, that I didn't think of them first. This aggravation is a healthy Stage 1 denial that is not too hard to flip into grudging respect for someone else while still being entertainingly pissed off in private. But let's face it, grudging respect only gets you points if the subject of the grudge gives a hoot about whether you do or don't come up with it. As Woody Allen riffed so long ago, what's the point of self-awareness if no one else notices that you have it? Although he explained it in the perverse ("I would never join a club that would have me as a member..."), he got right to the point.

Stage 2 denial is more like self-defense. Sometimes the target phrase of my distaste seems like a gratuitous dare, tossed out on the table like casual porn to see who in the room is either dumb enough to drop their cover of propriety and pick it up, or stupid enough to be manipulated into showing their low brow by dwelling on it even when something better was readily available. Resistance to being manipulated like this is identical to my rehearsed disdain of most (but nowhere near all) junk food: if it was my idea to have some, I still wouldn't tell anyone that it was my idea even if they caught me having it. Briefly, I had thought my initial bristling at the phrase "Web 2.0" was mostly of this sort.

But now, thanks to the posting on Boing Boing by Cory Doctorow, I'm comfortable with acknowledging a Stage 3 denial of the phrase, in which (this time) it is necessary to proactively ward off intellectual colonialism by fashionistas parading as "thought leaders". Truthfully, even at Stage 3 Denial, where you're blowing energy that could have been spent better elsewhere, there is normally still some entertainment to be had. The way you have fun with it is, for example, to choose a team and root like hell for it -- even though you know another team is probably better. The fun in this is all in the choice being willing, so much so that underdogs are actually more appealing than smug habitual winners. And the point is to not be told how to think. Furthermore, what's fun about rooting for teams whose winning just makes them smug? They're not more right for being winners, they're obnoxious. Ya just wanna smack 'em. The 1997 NY Yankees: "We want you to crave baseball all the time, but only if you're watching us." Whiners.

Parkinson's Law says that "buzz" will always expand to fill the volume of any container it is put in -- including the one between your ears. Insidious. Bad. Like millions of other folks, I just didn't know who coined the phrase "Web 2.0" ... Nor did I care, because, well, I hoped it would soon enough auto-inflate beyond the point of any gravitas. Yet more importantly, right at the beginning I sensed it trying to crowd out other thoughts and airtime around me. Then, Doctorow's Boing Boing post named names. Now I know that O'Reilly Media birthed the beast, and because they chose to be obnoxious about sharing it by handcuffing it to their lawyers, I can't retroactively grant them mere Stage 1 or Stage 2 denial. O'Reilly: "We want you to always be thinking about this as much as possible, but only if we tell you to!" Whiners.

The question we should ask is, if no one ever again said "Web 2.0", would there be even the slightest significant dip in the ability to talk about or understand what might happen next between the environment of the internet and the environment of consumer mentalities profit and non?

Duh, no. For starters, the idea of "the web" is not nearly as interesting now as "the channel", and even monetizing personalization is old news. In fact, the more interesting shift is not from Internetworking 1.0 to Internetworking 2.0 (which probably happened eight years ago), but instead from content personalization to access personalization. Gimme streaming hi-res Tivo'd podcasts of "Lost" and grad-school courses, with voice-activated search -- and no, I do not want to screw around with the plotlines. I do want really thin fold-out widescreens on the iPod, though. And/or a projector button, good enough to size and throw the image on an 8.5x11 piece of white paper.

And here's another "no". Is there any chance that only O'Reilly can explain what O'Reilly calls Web 2.0 as well as O'Reilly can? Uhh, no. Further, is there something I now understand better about Web 2.0 than I did yesterday before I knew O'Reilly had anything to do with it? No.

Really, the irony is that because the web 1.0 works pretty well it is much more likely that I could continue to go far not knowing or needing that O'Reilly be involved. Nonetheless, does O'Reilly have a vested interest in the fruits of promoting the attention to the future of cyberspace under the Web 2.0 banner? Sure. But giving them credit for the phrase is way different from giving them cash for it. Not only do I refuse to use the phrase Web 2.0 with anti-litigative quotes around it, I'm basically disinclined to use the phrase at all. So there.

Bonus Beats: For more fatiguing commercialism that makes you crabby, let's dwell on the stupidity of the Beatles suing Steve Jobs. I mean, really. Although, now we have a new twist on the "apples to apples comparison" idea. (What? You mean all this time, they're not alike?) Where we need this one to go is to have Jobs sign up Pez to do Paul McCartney bobblehead iPods, in time for the Christmas rush.

Boing.

Posted by Malcolm Ryder at May 28, 2006 11:10 PM

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Comments

Hey! just a NIT from a staunch Beatles fan -- a (partial) citation from Answers.com: "When the Beatles' partnership was dissolved in 1975, dissolution of Apple Corps was also considered, but it was decided to keep it going, while effectively retiring all its divisions. The company exists today, mostly performing as the licensing agent for Beatles-related products, and supervising reissues of Apple Records, plus new issues of Beatles recordings and related media. The company is apparently now owned by Apple Corps SA (a Swiss company) and its company secretary is listed as Standby Films Ltd., believed to be a vehicle of managing director Neil Aspinall. The company is currently headquartered at 27 Ovington Square, in London's prestigious Knightsbridge district."

Essentially, it is NOT the Beatles suing Apple, but rather Apple Records and/or parent Apple Corps, S.A. vs. Apple Computer, Inc.

Posted by: Howard Hastings at June 13, 2006 7:50 PM

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