One Ordinary Day With Piefights

So blogging is dead.

Again.

Well sure that makes me feel blue.

I mean, how am I -- a mere scribbler of transient words in the Wet Sand of Time -- a mere pisser of ephemera on the Urinal Cake of Eternity -- supposed to bear up under this disaster having already been shattered by the death of conversation, the death of the novel, the death of the short story, the death of radio, the death of live theater, the death of the rock and roll, the death of a salesman, the death of irony, the death of Ivan Ilyich, the death of stand-up, the death of the Republican Party, the death of retail,the death of portraiture, the death of Superman, the death of disco, the death of the Democratic Party, the death of the LP, the death of the newspaper, the death of the Western, the death of cities, my death of cold, the death of the essay, the death of Pets.com, the death of the cool, the death of science fiction, the death of the Hired Man, the death of the symphony, the death of traditional marriage, the death of Marat, the death of the metric system, the death of the bar scene, the death of the Ball Turret Gunner, the death of abstract expressionism, the death of outrage,

and of course sad stories of the death of kings;

How some have been deposed; some slain in war,
Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed;
Some poison'd by their wives: some sleeping kill'd;
All murder'd: for within the hollow crown
That rounds the mortal temples of a king
Keeps Death his court and there the antic sits,
Scoffing his state and grinning at his pomp,
Allowing him a breath, a little scene,
To monarchize, be fear'd and kill with looks,
Infusing him with self and vain conceit,
As if this flesh which walls about our life,
Were brass impregnable, and humour'd thus
Comes at the last and with a little pin
Bores through his castle wall, and farewell king!
Cover your heads and mock not flesh and blood
With solemn reverence: throw away respect,
Tradition, form and ceremonious duty,
For you have but mistook me all this while:
I live with bread like you, feel want,
Taste grief, need friends: subjected thus,
How can you say to me, I am a king?

Also the death of Eric Cartman.

OK, so where was I?

Oh yeah.

Ahem...

OMFG! The death of blogging! OMFG!

Whatever shall we do!

Blogging Is Legacy Technology: The Proof

by Jonathan Rauch

My doughty, authoritative criticisms (here and here) seem to have just about brought the blogosphere to its knees. Looking over some of the responses, I'd have to say that a lot of people either help make my point or miss it altogether. You can look here, here, here, and here for some of the smarter responses. They fall into a few categories.

"You're Comparing Apples and Oranges." The blogosphere is intended to be ephemeral, so accept it on its own terms.

Good advice, if only bloggers would follow it. As I keep saying, I'd have a better attitude about the blogosphere if it presented itself as a flea market instead of a revolution in human affairs. The MSM, imho, is way less self-congratulatory than the blogosphere.

"So's Your Mother." There's lots of bad stuff in old media, so nyah-nyah.

Right. My claim is not that old media are perfect, it's that blogging is a format that makes producing good stuff difficult, which is why there's much less good stuff in the blogosphere.
...

The app supports the fundamental human desire to engage in a sustained way with narrative and argument, which is why it will displace blogging as a medium of cultural importance. Blogging is a cultural dead end, trapped by its own idiosyncracies...

I watch with growing concern as young journalists get channeled into content mills where they post three, seven, who knows how many blog snippets a day. I spoke with one young guy who told me he puts up seven posts a day and would like to break into longer form by doing only three. One of the most promising young journalists I know couldn't take it and quit for medical school. Another young writer tells me he longs to "get off the hamster wheel."
...

And, yes, I admire David Broder.

You know, I'm gonna wear the seat of my Sunday pants all shiny if I have to keep sitting through this same damn wake over and over again.

Or hey, maybe blogging isn't dead?

Maybe this isn't about blogging at all?

Maybe this is about the main thing that monster sites like the Daily Beast really, really care about: traffic.

Maybe this is about larding up their biggest traffic driver with lots of new staff and interns and guest writers and djinns and curatoculturalists and grommet-oglers who conjure a transparently artificial, eyeball-attracting "controversy" out of thin air by whipping a handful of contrarian eggs around inside a very large glass house

And, yes, I admire David Broder.

and then "reacting" to them a few posts later

Blogging & the Failure of the Legacy Media: College Football Edition

by Alex Massie

Like an over-matched Jack Russell terrier, plucky Jonathan Rauch will neither let go nor go away. I salute the scamp and his rascally determination to snap at any passing ankle!

And, actually, I take his point that new technology such as Kindle singles, apps and whatever comes next will offer writers and readers new and interesting ways to engage with one another. But it's hardly Blogs vs Apps since why can't you have both?
...

in order to induce people to believe that there is some there there.

Maybe I don't give a rat's ass what Mr. Rauch has to say on the subject or, for that matter, anyone else who has read the Last Rites over the blogosphere's from high atop Mt. Insider over the last several years.

Maybe it's just a game they play for their own reasons.

Maybe it's just..."One Ordinary Day With Peanuts".

/Spoiler Alert/ If you haven't read Shirley Jackson's brilliant little monster of a short story originally published in "The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction" in January of 1955, first, shame, shame on you (PDF copy here) and second, go no further if you don't want to know how it ends./

The story is 90% about a man named Mr. John Phillip Jonhson, who walks out of his front door on a beautiful day with his pockets stuffed with candy and peanuts and proceeds to be extraordinarily generous and genial and all-around terrific to just about everyone he meets. From a single mother trying supervise the moving of her meager possessions into a truck while also watching her tiny son, to a young man and women that Mr. Johnson plucks out of their individual, harried mornings and sends off to enjoy the beautiful day all expenses paid, to a lost kitten...Mr. Johnson's sincerity and kindness are almost miraculous.

But then, when he gets home, every one of our expectations are upended...

...
Mrs. Johnson came out of the kitchen and kissed him; she was a comfortable woman, and smiling as Mr. Johnson smiled. "Hard day?" she asked.

"Not very," said Mr. Johnson, hanging his coat in the closet. "How about you?"

"So-so," she said. She stood in the kitchen doorway while he settled into his easy chair and took off his good shoes and took out the paper he had bought that morning.

"Here and there," she said.

"I didn't do so badly," Mr. Johnson said. "Couple young people."

"Fine," she said. "I had a little nap this afternoon, took it easy most of the day. Went into a department store this morning and accused the woman next to me of shoplifting, and had the store detective pick her up. Sent three dogs to the
pound—you know, the usual thing. Oh, and listen," she added, remembering.

"What?" asked Mr. Johnson.

"Well," she said, "I got onto a bus and asked the driver for a transfer, and when he helped someone else first I said that he was impertinent, and quarreled with him.

And then I said why wasn't he in the army, and I said it loud enough for everyone to hear, and I took his number and I turned in a complaint. Probably got him fired."

"Fine," said Mr. Johnson. "But you do look tired. Want to change over tomorrow?"

"I would like to," she said. "I could do with a change."

"Right," said Mr. Johnson. "What's for dinner?"

"Veal cutlet."

"Had it for lunch," said Mr. Johnson.

Excuse me now while I outfit my laptop with black crepe and turn all of my pictures of Mark Twain to the wall.