Blogging Apocalypse

Lions are laying down with lambs all across the Internet, and leaving their guns at home. The net never sits still. The follow-up story is always already writing itself.

As long as everyone's able to leave their yard now...

[[This post has helpful insertions to provide context and avoid misunderstandings -- in other words, I would hate for the blogworld to have to think too hard.]]

Well, I'm over the 11,000 mark for Google search results on my name and death threats.

And, this evening we have a goodly and rising tally of 448 for my name and hate speech.

[[fact and references added as hyperlinks]]

Isn't that interesting. Seems like something that might just piss you off if you weren't such the politically savvy marketing blogger and chariman of women's good will that I am proported to be...

[[insert tongue-in-cheek tag]]

Say, if you had been on the receiving end of hate speech online and didn't call a committee to lay blame and shoot the band before they could fire their first drummer.

[[uncomfortable rim shot]]

Try being a race mixer in the south, 21 years of marriage and a beige baby. Then talk to me about yards and safety and hate speech.

[[note self-empowerment through use of race-mixer term]]

And tell me if it would make you a little perturbed, if, say you never even mentioned somebody outside of your own blog, and there they were in the press saying you been doing bad things on another blog you didn't care much about, hardly read, only laughed once inappropriately about that Oprah thing, be4 the nasty words.

[[sad emoticon, chuckling emoticon, confused emoticon]]

You know what Johnny Carson used to say: "Women, they don't forget. Memories as long as Google. Boys, you can count on it." Or maybe that was me.

[[intentionally profound]]

What card is that again? I'm losing count. Race card, illness card, woman card, victim card... Doctor, lawyer, justice of the goddam peace, where are you? Gag me, hang me, shoot me. I still come knockin' on the front door of your cult to say "HI! Do you love me yet?"

[[metaphorically speaking]]

Do you want to talk about mean?

Would someone like to talk to me about mean?

[[rhetorical questions]]

About women silencing woman? About PTSD triggers, about who it's convenient to hang our hangups on? Sucks to have to go back to the source. Hurts back there. Baby, don't I know it. But we gotta go. Pull that barb out at the root--that's the only way to get through it.

[[trauma psychology -- look it up]]

Might make you think there's more to the story. Makes me think. Makes me think about being bullied into cliques I'm not hip to. Makes me make you, and you are made, understand, I never signed on to your story, but I'm there now.

[[so to speak]]

You coulda hired somebody else.

[[I mean, really.]]
...

a platform for further discussion.

I was looking forward to seeing what unfolded when Kathy Sierra and Chris Locke spoke together with CNN. Obviously, CNN went with the simple angle -- the cute kitty vs rageboy. jesus. reductionist reporting--even worse than what I've seen across the web this last week.

Fortunately, Chris and Kathy did make coordinated statements that offer a starting point for real discussion. If I have any regret around what has unfolded here, it is that I have not been able to write about these issues. I was silenced early on by repeated threats of legal and police action for something I did not do. I've barely felt well enough to get my real work done, let alone work up sufficient outrage over being asked to appologize for my choice in friends, which, for the record, I do not.

I'll write more about the issues that touched me personally in all of this when appropriate. For now, please return to the stars of the show.

...

3D fun++

Has anyone had their gallbladder out along with an ovary during the same procedure? If so, drop me an email or leave me a comment. I would appreciate if I could ask you a few questions.

I actually did something fun today for the first time in a long time--took Jenna to the 3-D Meet the Robinsons movie. I didn't realize until the ticket clerk stuffed the glasses under the bullet-proof glass that I had never seen a 3D movie before. These were no blue-and-read cardboard gasses. These were like real glasses.

The girls squeeled every time some robot part or space ship flew at us, and I found myself leaning left and right more than a few times. Seeing a horror flick in 3D I think could really kill someone. Or at least seriously trigger your PTSD. The gap in time between hands grabbing your neck and the reasoning power that would tell you "this is not real" is too tightly compressed. And the physical ducking to get out of the way evokes some eerie body memories.

I'll stick with G rated and leave the gasses in my purse.


....

the in betweens

wonderful post.

At most points in our lives, we are probably somewhere in the "in between." We can remember what it feels like to be in the difficult place and we can imagine ourselves free of hardship. Yet, in order to become emotionally and spiritually free of these burdens, we must go through the "in between"- a place of struggle, confusion, growth, potential and healing.

...

As I was heard to have said last week...

"The only problem with the Net is that it can't shut its mouth for five seconds."


...

Some Kind of Shit

AKMA warns of bags and dog poo and a bacteria no one wants named after them. April Fools? Sounds too believable.

Further analysis revealed that among the samples in the test, not only were there the expected black poopons and white poopons, but a third and rarer bacterium with some characteristics of each. This third sort of contaminant has a tighter structure that enables it to pass through the thinner plastic bags that some dog owners use — the bag that protects the Sunday New York Times, for instance, or fresh produce bags, especially the semi-porous green bags often used at up-market organic grocers.

Moral of the story: Use Teflon.

...

women's best friend

There is no faster way to silence a man than to publicly put into question the genuineness of his respect for women. At some level, the unspoken threat of voice castration makes the men who continue to write personally about women online braver and more vulnerable than the subjects of their words.

The tragedy is that many men opt for silence rather than risk the de-balling. I can't blame them. The treasure is that some of them keep writing anyway.

In comments I was reminded about one treasure who continues writing, whose words touch women in nearly every post. Thanks, Shakespierce.

From Tony Pierce...

....its hard to be intimidated by a waitress chick at dennys in LA, but i noticed that there were two types of girls who id end up asking out more than once. one were the girls who made me feel super cool and handsome.

but unfortunately the ones i ended up liking the most were the ones who made me nervous and made me feel ugly and disgusting. maybe its because i know im pretty damn disgusting.

also, i like being nice, and the girls who made me feel gross usually ended up on the nicer dates. whereas the sweet librarian types usually got their hair pulled harder and far more kinkier things ending up in their mouth and asshole than the other girls.

ive also been known to whisper some pretty foul things in the ears of shocked lass. but theyre always creative. and some are even possible.

the other night i had this girl tied up real good, face down because she was bad, i forget what she had done. oh yes, she had forgotten her plaid skirt. whore. and everything was going fine and she was still tied up and i was all is everything ok over there, and i lit a cigarette for her and she said yea and i put the cigarrette in her mouth because her arms were still tied to the bedpost you see.

and i said what do you wanna do next and she said tony i will do anything with you.

and if that doesnt make you feel like a handsome devil with a footlong cock then youre in deep trouble.

so i blew out the torch and got her worked up and she was a loud one which usually distracts me but ive been working on it. and i was whispering some shit and she was saying yes to everything and moaning and yelling and i whispered im gonna call your sister and let her hear you moan and she said please dont but she moaned it confusing me, which isnt to say i wasnt a bit worked up too, and we had drunken all that straight rum and something was smoked

and i was all, ok does she really not want me to dip into her purse and grab the phone and... or what? and i said im gonna put this phone in a very bad place and then call it with my phone and she said mmmmm and i said then im gonna sell it on ebay and she said mmmmm and i said and im gonna sell the video ive been making of this whole thing and she said mmmmm and i wondered if she heard me so i said and i will sell the dvd of what we just did for an hour and she said mmmmm and i realized that her phone had been on vibrate the whole time

and youd never guess when youre little who you wouldnt call back when youre older.

....

Just A Few Words

Regarding the Kathy Sierra fracas, after much consideration and silence on my part, I am beyond tired and beyond angry. I have been wrongly named and targeted, tied to death threats I didn't make and tasteless posts I didn't write.

Did I link to the blogs prior to the offensive posts appearing? Yes. So did a lot of other people in the blogosphere, because there was some brilliant writing there before the blogs wrapped themselves around a tree.

I'm now up to 681 hits on google with my name and "death threats" combined, have received emails from people saying they've gotten comments condemning them for linking to or advertising with this blog because “she has been involved in making death threats against Kathy Sierra,” which is not true.

As my family name is raked over the coals across the web and in mainstream press, I would ask those of you who decided to tie me to these threats to spend the time I just did sitting still, considering your own motives and assumptions.

There are layers and layers of important issues that intelligent people can tackle and use to make meaning out of this. I hope that effort moves forward.

To all of you who have demonstrated your support, I thank you.

...

For the record

It is terrible that someone has made death threats against Kathy Sierra. I hope that she pursues those individual(s) vigorously. I expect that she will use that same intense energy to publicly exonerate those who did not make those threats.

update april 22:

....still waiting.

...

recipe

warms you doesn't it,
nerves tingling
places you can't
reach
your
lies stretch
so far up.

venom sweet
tip of tongue
strychnine in
a muffin tin,
perfect desert
crumbs line
your mouth like
dimestore lipstick.

bake me a cake
just as fast as you can
cool it on the window sil
before the sun licks
the frosted foothills.

sudden exposure,
your finest creases
are still etched
in the linen that slips away.

no home

no home no home to go home to
stuffed bear
where
miles and miles far
don't send me away
the first time they
send me, i wonder
who will take care of me?

go home no home
write my way through
find ground
that doesn't make me quake
take me away
don't take me
who will take care of me?

faceless ghosts burn
my face
fire for
fingers
running through me
too hot to stand
can't get out of my
own skin.

stop!

is there an ending, another beginning?
the seconds unbearable,
waiting.

best of weekend

you gotta check out all the good blogs on my blogroll. far more interesting than mine at the given moment. go now, do read!

...soon.

Bigger Than Twitter -- It's TWATTER!!!

on twatter, i show how i might as well have shoved $50 into an orifice instead of paying it to cingular to receive other people's dinner plans on my phone.

THIS JUST IN:

The web's newest solution to twittering is, not twattering, well maybe, depending -- but also UNCLEBOBISMS. Join those of us who know better but do it anyway. UPDATE 2 - never mind, it's gone, never posted there. I was doing time in the hospital instead. Yeah, I know. The fun never stops. Update 3: Let me be more specific -- I did not join or logon to uncebobism. I did not add myself to the blog. When i linked to the blog in this post, it had a witty post about twitter. By the time I got out of the hospital, the blog was gone and I had not read it in days.

For the record, the only group blogs I participate on are Blog Sisters and BlogHer. I started Blog Sisters in 2001. It is a blog I am now seriously considering ending. I have to ask some questions about blogher as well. I will be doing that this week.

Whose words are we a part of online--i am the words written here and in comments I leave. My group blogging experience has been part of what I do online that I think has been valuable since I started blog sisters in 2001. But I am no more than my own words. It comes down to that. And so I am currently looking at ways to end my group associations.

I can't believe it. Really. That I've come this far. This long.

I have always stood by my own words, what I've written here and on blogsisters and blogher and the attempts at humor on jeremy's blog. But this is the only place I control. The only place that's mine.

The blog world and group blogs are different now than they were when I started blog sisters. I am deep in thought. Those who know me know I am. For those who don't--I wish you did.

What Are You Doing April 20th?

It's a friday. You must be free. If not, get free.

Come by allied ALL DAY, where I'll be writing original poetry and prose, realtime, in memory of my father, who died of pancreatic cancer in his 30s.

Your job? HELP ME RAISE $500 for PANCAN!

Sponsor me in The First Annual BLOG POETRY FEST for PANCAN here on allied.

All funds go to the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network (PANCAN), an advocacy group for patients and families dealing with pancreatic cancer. The event is set up through FirstGiving in conjunction with PanCan to raise awareness and funds for continued research, education, and advocacy.

More information will be coming soon, but in the mean time, inspire me and save the date.

...

ire

Alphonse "Tootie" Dimino
December 16, 1930 - March 17, 1969


the school of the dead

As I waver between life and death in my own hospital bed, 30 years after his death, on his birthday in fact, I am somehow not surprised. Terrified, yes. Facing death is not something I'm prepared for. My new baby is just 9 weeks old. How did I get here?

When you lose a parent early in life, you wonder if you'll make it past the age they were when they left you. Every child of death wonders this. That's why I'm not surprised to be near death myself at 36, the same age he was when the luck of the Irish eluded him.

In my hospital bed, hemorrhaging uncontrollably, I am violently enrolled in what Cixous calls, "The School of Dreams." Because I don't die; I live. But in walking the line between here and there, I dream. Images as vibrant as those five-year-old memories, scenes that will carry me through the next half of my life.

Bleeding to near death. Watching helplessly as my lifeforce leaves my body, playing tricks with my mind and taking small pieces of my soul with it, my sanity too. The emptiness is unfathomable. As a new mother, instincts of self-protection battle with the responsibility of caring for this new life. I don't want to see her; don't want her to see me, not like this. My one gift to her: protect her from images of her dying parent--I know how they haunt.

But she comes to visit just before surgery. My sister carries her down the elevator toward the operating room, this small life that has almost cost me mine.

Anxiety gives way to resolve. Once again, I cannot control. I cannot fix myself, I cannot fix my family. I let go, I go to sleep. And I dream.

Dreams of pain. Dreams of loss--where is my baby? My husband is gone--no, there he is. And I hear talking, outside of myself. Again.

I am a dream within a dream. A death within a death.

-------------------------

the school of the dead 2

Cixous writes: "For a long time I lived through my father's death with the feeling of immense loss and childlike regret, as in an inverted fairy tale: Ah, if my father had lived! I naively fabricated other magnificent stories, until the day things changed color and I began to see other scenes--including everything I could imagine that was less consoling--without overinvesting."


I tell all my friends growing up that my father died of a gallbladder operation. Because no one tells me otherwise, even though he lived another six months after that operation. My fourth grade teacher tells me it is very unusual for someone to die of a gallbladder operation. She says, "Are you sure?" And I wonder if I'm hiding something.

I'm 21 before I ask.

My mother tells me the truth then, about the day he had his operation and the doctors took her in a room, there by herself, to tell her that her husband's gallbladder is fine, but his pancreas isn't. The diagnosis is pancreatic cancer. The prognosis, much as it is today, omonous. Six months maybe. My mother tells me the news rips her apart, and her first and strongest instinct is to wail for her own father. "Bring my daddy here. He'll know what to do. I need him." But there is no comforting to be done for this family.

There will never be comfort again.

-------------------------

voicelessness

because, there is no bypass for loss.

....

Unprotected and vulnerable, there are no words to clothe you, to make you beautiful. You are raw, revealing yourself by the clumsiness in your covering. we live naked, a rack of peacock feathers can't cover your scars.

I see every one of them in the space between your words.

.

tara talks twitter

tara tells why she loves twitter over on HPC. I commented on my on-again-off-again twitter relationship. When the soup kitchens start twittering, let me know. Maybe then I'll fall back in love again. In the mean time, keeping up with who's dining where makes jane a dull and hopeless girl.

My own personal twitter love/hate timeline is as follows:

• heard about twitter: sept/oct 2006
• my first twitter -- fell in love: november 2006
• dinner and shopping twits hog the airwaves -- fell out of love: december 2006
• added horse-head guy to profile, fell back in love -- january 2007
• conference minions yammer on // scoble joins; there goes the neighborhood -- fell out of love: feb 2007
• kat herding fun increases, fell back in love - march 2007
• more bloggers affirm micro-attention preference, and i'm out of love again.
  

twit on.

so this pain i'm in and other stuff

right, i'm trying to get healthy--you know that thing i keep talking about--which has me beating the literal shit out of myself at the Y as frequently as possible. today i cried it hurts so bad. a lady there is helping me figure out what to do to make a difference before i either die or give up and hang myself from the bicep, tricep, glutes and quads torture machines. film at 11.

yesterday was a breakthrough whereby i did 25 minutes on the eliptical, followed by my regular workout. first time in that place i couldn't do 25 minutes at the water fountain. so there's something.

i don't like to talk about this stuff because it's all triggery, whereby i have this retro-ptsd type thing all tied up in with it, so generally if i start talking too much about it, i'll stop and hand over whatever progress i made to satan and whoever else is in charge of the Bad Shit.

I missed seeing Shakespierce and other friends at SXSW this year. Ack. Maybe next year. Tony's the hardest working guy in showbidness 2.0, and the best part is that he is who he is who he is, having fun all along the way, grown up enough to be able to write about it from the other side, still young enough for the 'it' not to kill him.

I am a little freaked by the facial hair, understanding that last year at sxsw tony was clean shaven. Athough, none of this really matters, but it does take my mind off of that pain i was talking about.

I love Tony's story about the panel hugh was on, and his take on what bugs him about kathy sierra's approach to the web, for example he says:

[[also on the panel is Kathy Sierra who seems superdooper nice but i disagree with pretty much everything she says. beginning with "don't say I too much in your blog" and "listen to your readers". no offense, and everyone knows that i adore my readers so much that sometimes i literally love them, but seriously, fuck the readers. write from your heart and if they get it good and if they dont let them fucking die. but seriously shes a sweetie and pretty much the womans touch of the blogosphere.]]

okay but tony if you say that approaching blogging HER WAY is the woman's touch of the blogsphere, i'm going to have to head butt you, you nimwit. you know better than that. don't make me kick your ass--i told you i am in PAIN.

nonetheless i remain your faithful fan and pupil.

So about the pain thing, I got this cream from my therapist, made by a guy down in bradenton florida, it's called Savannah Gold, and THIS SHIT IS GREAT. If you like that hoticynumbing cream that lasts and takes away the ouch, then cover yourself with this cream. there was a website on the label so i ordered three more jars. i'm telling you, i don't know what's in there that might not be listed, but forget that shaklee stuff i sell and get this cream. just three of the many ingredients listed on the site are:

Camphor: Derived from the wood of the camphor tree. It gives a cool feeling to the skin and works as a skin conditioning agent, antiseptic and anesthetic.

Capsaicin: Stimulant, biological product that relieves aches and pains of arthritis by intercepting the pain signals sent to the brain by inflamed joints.

Aloe Vera: From the leaves of one or more species of aloe, it is used to treat burns and mild abrasions-- a mild skin conditioning agent.

Time for my nightly application. No i'm not making money on the cream; it's just helping me not hurl myself down a flight of stairs.

Tony gets the prettiest girls, i swear!


...

no lists, just action - speaker diversity and the top-dog bypass

Chris Pirillo wonders why Gnomedex didn't make Kottke's list of conferences examined for their percentages of male vs female speakers.

I'd say it's a good thing Gnomedex didn't make the list, because, although it's an interesting idea to compare today's hot Internet conferences based on these percentages, it's sort of like addressing a zero balance in your bank account by changing the numbers in your checkbook register.

It doesn't really address the lllaaarrgggerrr ppprrrooobbllem.

I wish more tech conferences were like gnomedex, and that more of today's web-tech conference organizers were like chris and ponzi. Gnomedex was fostering discussion on the tech landscape LONG before today's webby conferences (and conference organizers), many of whom are doing what they do to capitalize on web 2.0 money, the Internet economy, and the social media 'who's who' scene.

THOSE are the conferences I inherently distrust and see as suspect, and they nearly always give me reason to distrust, because they almost always take the speaker bypass of looking at the technorati top 100 or Top Dogs or Founding FATHERS of blogging, and approach them for speaking slots. These individuals are STILL the easiest to come across when you skim the web looking for voices-as-commodity. They are also pretty good themselves at going after gigs. Easy, visible targets beget easy quick conferences beget money in pockets beget notoriety for speakers and conferences, which beget more speaking gigs and conferences.

Chris and Ponzi don't skim the web. They live here with us. They participate--participated before it was trendy and highly lucrative. That is why I trust them to put together a good, representative conference, and to listen to ideas for speakers and topics if people think they should do it differently.

Back to the Kottke list: There is no universal diversity percentage that makes things okay.

Wouldn't that be simple? It would allow for more bypasses, faster conference planning, and more predictable tracks. It would allow everything to be fair and just, and would mean that no one would have to think about their own beliefs and motives. Just fill in the 38% diversity quotient at work, and then you don't have to wonder if it's okay that you wish your new neighbors weren't black.

The "right" number of women speakers for a deeply-tech tech conference might differ from the "right" number for a social marketing conference. Because there is no right number.

Except for NOT ZERO.

AND PROBABLY. NOT ONE EITHER.

Use your fucking heads.

How to find good speakers? Ask the people you know who are in the populations you think are sparse or missing. Better yet, START READING PEOPLE who don't look like everyone else in your aggregator or blogroll. Then read who they read.

And if you really don't know any women or people of color, expand your world a little bit. Get off your computer, get out of your fucking house, city, state, and/or cultural comfort zone to-day.

THEN plan a conference.

Weblog Award Winner for Best Use of Tags and Categories

CLARIFICATION: THIS POST WAS WRITTEN BEFORE THE NOW INFAMOUS, OVER-THE-TOP "POSTS" WERE MADE BY A MEMBER OF THE MEANKIDS.ORG BLOG. THE BLOG WAS TAKEN DOWN AS SOON AS THE SITE ADMIN BECAME AWARE OF THE OFFENSIVE POST.

Kathy Sierra has since said publicly that she knows those who she named initially had nothing to do with the post that concerned her. In fact, she removed her blogged accusation from her blog, but for me, the damage was done. Google doesn't forget.

-----------


MEAN KIDS DOT ORG!!! YEAH!!!

for: embalmed ones, those that are trained, suckling pigs, mermaids, fabulous ones, stray dogs, those included in the present classification, those that tremble as if they were mad, innumerable ones, those drawn with a very fine camelhair brush, others, those that have just broken a flower vase |


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