October 28, 2002
I realized something recently: You can have two warring parties, locked into a deadly conflict of seemingly irreconcilable differences, involving issues so complicated and convoluted they could make your head spin. But I found out that if I stood up between the two warring parties and announced: "HEY! I'm an idiot. I don't know what the hell I'm talking about!" Finally you could have a point of view that both warring parties could readily agree upon.
I also realized that I greatly under-estimated The Power of The Computer. I mean, I only figured out how to get on the web and make a web-site 2 weeks ago. And it was only my second column, only my SECOND DAMN DAY ON THE WEB, and already I had put my foot in my mouth and gotten into the middle of a big ole mess. I mean, usually it takes me at least a couple of months to get into trouble. But TWO DAYS is a new record, even for me. I ended up having to spend three days mailing out about 20 apologies/retractions, as well as fielding endless urgent emails, as well as dodging zhit left and right, as well as having to stay drunk for three days on Old English Malt Liquor just to quiet the queazy jitters in my very guts.
I think a lot of it is that nobody really knows what these computers are and what they can do. I mean, I spent a good part of this decade sleeping in the bushes in a sleeping bag, so I kind of slept through most of the developments of the so-called Computer Age. Therefore, I was kind of shocked when I finally got on the web recently, only to discover there were about 50 sites that referred to me or my work. I mean, I had assumed, during my long period of self-imposed bumhood, that I had slipped into a richly-deserved, and much-needed, obscurity. Only to discover that my work, and my sordid past, was being broadcast to potential millions by a brand new medium that I didn't begin to understand.
My first thought was: "Wow, I'm famous!" My second thought was: "Can they really publish my work on the net without my permission?" And my third thought was: "Gee, I wonder if theres any way I could make any money off this computer stuff?"
Nobody really knows what this computer stuff is all about. We're all figuring it out on the fly. Like the Napster thing. Nobody was sure if this was a crime or not, simply because nobody had ever done it before. I think theres going to be a lot of issues like this that get worked out over the years.
COnversely, theres a lot of people that seem to have OVER-estimated the power of the computer. There were all those dot-commer dudes who thought they could make a fortune off this so-called powerful new medium, only to all go broke.
Or take the recent legal spat involving the two cartoonists that got me thinking about all these computer issues in the first place. One of the cartoonists says it was a harmless computer prank. The other cartoonist says it was a serious computer crime. Who knows? Certainly not me, which is why I should have kept my big fat mouth shut in the first place.
But I think we're ALL going to make some computer-related mistakes over the years. We're all going to do some things without considering the ramfications of what we've done, simply because nobody has ever done this stuff before. So maybe we should take that into consideration.