One of your recent diaries demonstrates how far behind the curve some mainstream entities are - http://www.raisingka...
One way of looking at meta is as an informal subset of a larger domain that is "information theoretical." That realm contains a fair amount of interesting work (e.g., the long tail), but there's also a large body of a kind of pseudo-science that appears to be disproportionately affected by - I don't know - old school Russian theosophy or something quite like it.
Your diary here reflects a larger issue: a number of paradigms have not yet been adequately fleshed out or integrated into the larger culture. If I had to name RK's niche product, I would say it's results (and work) oriented effectiveness. And while I know it's not the case for many, that's the "product" I'm after. There's no shortage of theory elsewhere, elegant or not.
Secondly, as an informal experiment, I was interested in answering this question: can a person who is isolated physically impact politics in a significant way? This is (was actually) an entertaining component of my blog interest.
Recently there was a thread train about "wanting better."
Metafilter
Waldo Jaquith
blacknell
Blogs cast the classic tension between quantity and quality in sharp relief. Here's just one example - now historical - showing that such sentiment is not a new phenomenon:
The Internet boom of the 1990's brought new changes and challenges. In the 80's, Usenet traffic was carried mostly across private networks and dial-up connections between network sites, but the Internet was faster and could carry Usenet to more places - and more people, as private homes connected to the Internet in large numbers. At first, the veteran Usenet community resented this influx of "newbies," particularly the ones from fast-growing online service America Online.
etc. There are many other examples. Usenet tied together tiny highly specialized communities that were scattered around the globe. Those communities adapted - here's an example from 1993 where OP-SF NET created a newsletter: http://cio.nist.gov/...
blacknell focused on this sentence -
I don't have the time anymore to wade through all the stuff.
That's exactly why I don't read several genres of fiction. Something had to go.
On the political front we remain in an arduous phase of governmental restoration and accounting. The swamp is still draining, the noise level is nearly intolerable, and things are not very pretty. The people who are making a substantive difference right now are working their asses off. Not everyone has the stomach for it.
Just to stay within one or two degrees of online separation, in addition to teacherken, here are a few more folks who have been at RK at one time or another and are now making an impact on the national scene over at DK - a fine super-selected sliver of humanity:
-- RenaRF transcribed Bush's recent speech
-- beachmom caught Fox news monkeying around with transcripts.
-- and she also wrote a kickass story on Webb and Iran
-- Kagro X writes quality material almost every day
And the ePluribus Media Community is making the 2000 pages DOJ pdf dump searchable.
Every single one of them does their research. And they all work through the tedium.
Marcy Wheeler's book, Anatomy of Deceit, was 99.99% perspiration. Go read her DK diaries to see just how much perspiration was involved. Here's her bio from amazon:
About the Author
Marcy Wheeler blogs under the name "emptywheel" at the political blog The Next Hurrah. Her PhD and academic background - relating to citizen journalism at times of heavy propaganda - brings a unique perspective to her blogging and the CIA leak case. Several of her posts have scooped the mainstream media's coverage of the Plame Affair, including her coverage of Scooter Libby's NIE leaks. She is a self-employed business consultant based in Ann Arbor, MI.
Ya'll.
Skim, focus, work, rest. There's no other way to do it really. Am I above whining? Hell, no. I've even stamped my feet on my "notes to self" blog about something as trivial as the quality of linux distributions. Quality is sucky in all kinds of places.
Here's something to think about when it comes to blogs. dailykos is blue and freerepublic is red. They're from alexa, and you can click on them to get a better view.
What incredible momentum up until the election. Taking the view over the last 6 months shows how steep the drop was post-election, and how freerepublic may be holding better than dailykos.
I'd like to see the opposite. More involvement. More participation. More noise. Even if it means more typos. If it's too much for me, I can walk away just like everyone else.