[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

The ClueTrain Manifesto



Would want to have Robyn being the only one to not make a webpage...

Dan Green's Look at The ClueTrain Manifesto

I found that I could make comparisons to what was said in this, well, diatribe against the current, or corporately perceived, market flows to both my research on the whole MP3 fiasco and some of Neuman's conclusions.

I have to admit that while I thought Neuman was a bit strange to read at times, the author of the Clue Train must really be drinking a bit too much coffee, or soon to be unemployed at the Post Office. The tone seemed so strained and desperate to show everyone what the "real world" was, that while I did agree with quite a few of his points, I would want to have him (she?) standing by my side as a supporter. Stallman wasn't involved in any way, was he?

Point 6: "The Internet is enabling conversations among human beings that were simply not possible in the era of mass media." Neuman (p.166) was very clear in his view that "if many citizens are ill-informed, misinformed...not because the price of a newspaper is too high...Such public attitudes and behaviors are not the beginning of a new...trend; they are political constants, the backdrop against which new technologies are introduced." The MP3 "scandal" is a simple case. Illegal MP3s exist. The RIAA has gone about screaming about it. Yet people don't care. "...there are plentiful opportunities for the modern Thomas Paine to try to raise the consciousness of his fellow citizens... most citizens are not inclined to pay much attention." (Neuman 165) The enabled conversations could be the exchange of MP3s, yes, but what happened to the RIAA being able to get its point across through the new media of the Internet? Why do we all still listen to Top Ten Singles from our computers?

Perhaps we need to skip into the theses beginning at number 68. "The inflated self-important jargon you sling around—in the press, at your conferences—what's that got to do with us?" This screams the RIAA at me. The entire Soundbyting propaganda program can be volleyed off Thesis 68 and Thesis 71 ("Your tired notions of "the market" make our eyes glaze over. We don't recognize ourselves in your projections—perhaps because we know we're already elsewhere.") like a good game of pong. The words go on and on, yet the alternatives are not being offered to us. The RIAA needs to offer us something in return to supplement the loss of the world of MP3s (Thesis 75). Tools like Napster and the many clones out there are creating an entirely new mass market (Thesis 72) and the satisfaction is increasingly much more than anything the Record Companies have ever delivered to us.

MP3.com is leading the way in thesis 76, "new tools we need, some better service," with the My.MP3.com service that they have begun to offer, but the old style of business, and its avatar, the RIAA, refuses to allow the interloper within its domain.

I have just pointed out a few of those theses that I agreed with and that I feel, can be viewed in the light of WinAmp and Napster. But more are there, and I imagine that Harry will have pointed out a few himself.

Dan