Tuesday, June 21, 2005

Though blogging may have the staying power of silly putty, it feels palpable enough. And it's so easy to begin and add to that it has been exploding at bytespeed. Apparently anyone and almost everyone can do it, and it should come as no surprise what has happened as a result:

With a hot new venue accessible with a few keystrokes, the prepubescent crazies who took over the chat rooms with their emoticons and smileys a few years ago and the personal voyeur camsites that mushroomed shortly afterward have rediscovered the power of the written word and flooded into the big room with newfound literacy. And of course the political fringies have poured in to spew their extremes, the writer wannabes have finally found a guaranteed publisher with no rejection slips, and the sensitive souls have found a sympathetic shoulder for their soft simperings. All the tribal interests have gotten the message: the blogosphere is now where it's at.

In other words, whatever we were doing before blogs, chances are we are still doing. Nothing has changed; we just have a new way to be the way we were, the way we are, the way we may want to be.

It's a big room, a wondrous room of many voices. In time some clear ones may emerge above the general din, but I love the diversity of the din itself, the democracy of it, the freedom to choose whom to read, comment to, subscribe to or ignore, no matter who they are or what their background may be. It may be very close to the ideal of free speech envisioned in the Constitution.

And speaking of freedom to say what we think, thank the founding fathers' deistic gods for that first amendment! What might they think of this "blogosphere" we've made, with everyone talking at once yet the chance for an individual voice to be discerned? without interruption, without censorship, by any who want to? It is truly amazing.

If ever young students needed a further incentive to learn good writing skills, this blogging thing might be it. It is so empowering--the modern equivalent of the trusty "equalizer" of the Old West. It makes everyone the same size.

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