Not knowing him in flesh and bones, nor knowing anything about his life other than what he disclosed in this blog, I get that odd feeling of mourning for someone I did not actually know.
Yet, by the many posts and comments I've read from him, as a regular in this blog for the last 4 years or so, I can't help but feel an empty virtual space.
Other than our shared spacetime interval in this pale blue dot we live in, we also shared this strange habit of spending time in a blog, arguing with people we may never see, exchanging bits and thoughts for the sake of God knows what.
Blogs themselves are dying away, soon to be a relic in the ever changing and growing network of things.
In a few years, all our posts, comments, fights and profound insights in display here will be reduced to a particular state of electrons and molecules, stored in the basements of the NSA and other few memory holes designed to keep track of the activity way back then.
It will be less than tears in rain.
11 comments:
Beautifully said Clovis.
Goodby Howard, maybe we'll all meet in a better place someday.
Blogs themselves are dying away, soon to be a relic in the ever changing and growing network of things.
I hope not.
Just read FB has 2B members!!!!
Skipper,
Blog creation peaked in 2006-2008.
Most blogs I read have been showing decaying readership for some time, including this one.
And most tellingly, the newer generations pay less attention to blogs.
With all that said, the internet is big, and blogs may well die very slowly or morph to something else.
I have no doubt blog creation peaked, but I think part of the reason is that there are other social media choices that are simply better for most people available today. For example, if you just want to quip away from time to time or show a few photographs, twitter, facebook and instagram are just way better choices now, but were non-existent or in their infancy when blogs were still growing in popularity.
Blogs are for those who want to write essays and need a format that is optimal for larger pieces or writing. I suspect blogging will continue to have a niche for that for quite some time even though there aren't all that many people like us.
Also note that even on this blog, there are more readers than commenters. When I write consistently, readership grows even though the number of commenters does not.
Bret, that's interesting about readers. Have you any way of knowing who they are? I call you guys my geniuses and it would be good to have a few new members because I fear as you guys get older, the burden of maintaining this high a level of genius will become too onerous.
;-{
Each new generation usually wants to do their own thing, so I predict FB, twitter, etc. will be replaced with ??? Just read smart phones are only 10 years old. Can't even imagine what's coming next.
erp,
I know some "lurkers." Other than the ones I know, I have no way to tell who else reads this blog.
It's typical in most sorts of social media for only a fraction of readers to actually interact.
Maybe some brave soul will jump in knowing he/she is welcome.
Blogs let me know people I could never meet otherwise. Justification enough for me.
[Clovis:] Most blogs I read have been showing decaying readership for some time, including this one.
And most tellingly, the newer generations pay less attention to blogs.
With all that said, the internet is big, and blogs may well die very slowly or morph to something else.
Besides Great Guys, I frequent Lileks, Ace of Spades, Slate, Volokh, Althouse, and Best of the Web
I think you are probably on to something about age. However, each of those I visit routinely get more than a hundred comments per post. And they, for the most part, engage in discussions that Twitter et al can't begin to cover. (I almost never look at the comments on Ace, but they seem the exception.)
Some things just can't be addressed in 140 characters.
Skipper, your list is similar to mine, except I like PJMedia as well and stopped Althouse when she voted for Obama -- twice. The articles on Ace are interesting, but the comments are usually off topic and sophomoric. Don't know why that would be?
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