March 15, 2004

Cracking the Egg

In other DeanNews, Dean Landsman wonders a.) if there would have been weblogs if not for Dave Winer's initial vision and product push, and b.) what the purpose is for the blog chicks session at the upcoming conbloggercon.

I'm glad that Lisa and team are doing the women and blogs roundtable at bloggercon, specifically because it's bloggercon, and if you know those who float around the meniscus of bloggercon, you too would be glad women have a foothold there.

The point for me isn't to question whether or not there's a women and weblogs session at bloggercon. It's to question why we insist on capturing and locking weblogging up inside our stupid old business-as-usual rituals, like conferences, which blogging is really an antidote for. By joining us together through conversation in a space that is anything but physical, blogging is different. Why can't we just let that be so?

No one (except maybe the product folks) grabbed on to blogging because they thought one day they might get to sit on a panel of influential business people. We grabbed onto weblogging because it was the answer to the kind of back-patting traditional snoresville we'd had to suffer in business.

That's not to say I don't think bloggercon will be fun. I know it will be--for crying out loud--you have bloggers there! What's not to be fun about that! Stealth discoing and stuff. That's funny. I dig that.

But I continue to fight the trend I see for us to get a little too carried away with our bad selves, ladies and gentleman.