So I just saw a Colbert Report where he interviews a guy named Andrew Keen, author of the new book The Cult of the Amateur. This guy apparently decided that the best use of this time, was to write a book about the internet, and how it's going to doom civilization. In the interview he called bloggers and others involved in publishing online a bunch of amateurs, without standards who are destroying culture (and largely because we don't demand a fee I might add). We aren't actual artists, we destroy art.
I'd take more offense to his comments and be more likely to bitch about the book, except I don't think anyone will be able to take it seriously. Plus, I'm not foreseeing the internet dropping off the face of the earth as a result. I also thing the world's bloggers probably carry more sway than his book does anyway (even if we are a bunch of lying amateurs with no standards).
As for my own blog, I can proudly say that I understand what I write will be read by other people and that when it comes to issues of fact, I do my darndest to get things right. When speaking solely about personal experience or giving my opinion, well, that's what a blog is for isn't it. It's up to my readers to decide for themselves what to make of my stories, ideas, and opinions. So I'm glad Keen got all of that off his chest. Now, he can leave everyone the hell alone. After all, there's some irony in the fact that he's doing the same thing we are, just in the printed word. I'm not sure how that makes him better.
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3 comments:
A wonder if Andrew Keen is simply taking an absurd position to sell his book? I would so *love* to 'debate' him.
My first question would be, "Why don't you believe in the right to free speech?"
As far as self-publishing goes, our most famous of Founding Fathers, Benjamin Franklin, was a self-made man, without a formal education, and changed the world through self-publishing.
Blogs are as American as apple pie and this British tart Keen needs to realize that his country already lost that war.
P.S. I guess I'm not an artist either? Afterall, all I do for a living is write computer software that I sell to millions of people, and I write books that are sold to many others. I am published in magazines, newspapers, scientific journals, and the like. Heck, I'm even a graphic artist, you can view my portfolio (for free) at this link:
http://aarm.mywowbb.com/~jratcliff/gallery/index.html
I'm not certain I have ever seen a more arrogant prick in my entire life.
His argument is the same one espoused by King Louis and Marie Antoinette, and we know what happened to them.....
He's just an idiot. That's like saying that independent artists are destroying record labels.
It's an argument you hear in Europe a lot. Basically, they are just complaining that readership of traditional mags and newspapers is declining. All other arguments are mere window-dressing.
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