In a surprise development related to the controversy generated earlier this week by Dave Winer's decision to be a punkass brat who doesn't know the meaning of playing well with others, Ziff Media's eWeek (a holdover publication title from 1893) ran a story titled Bloggers Up in Arms Over Closure of Weblogs.com. The article in itself offered no new insights that could not be gleaned from Mr. Winer's own after-the-fact attempts to rationalize his clearly irrational act. For example, take his statement on Scripting.com this morning...

"There are a couple of memes that are travelling around the net. First that somehow you have to be careful of what you say or I won't export your site."

This "meme" was very likely started by Mr. Winer himself when he posted the following -- three days earlier -- at the top of the page inviting comments about how he planned to dispose of "old weblogs" that he had formerly hosted:

Groundrules: Personal comments, ad hominems, will be deleted. And no negotiating or whining. Just post the url of your site.

Dave Winer � 6/13/04; 1:49:19 PM

Instead of adding insult to injury, one might have hoped the wanker had at least offered the pretense of a little goddam civility. Never noted for his tact -- or logic -- Winer himself whines on and on in a rambling audio post, which includes the following dumbfuck sound bite:

"You could say I should have explained it, and I could have done better, and you know, you may be right, that I should have, and I could have. It's possible. But it's also not clear to me that people wouldn't have found something else to find fault with. I mean, this is sort of the attitude on the internet, is that, uh you know, it's sorta like, people just love to jump up and down, and it hardly matters how well you do something, 'cause certain things happen, and people will jump up and down. So, just accept that."

OK, Massah Winah, Sah. Acceptin' that over here, Boss.

But you know... he's actually right about netheads' inclination to criticize others without letup. I have long wanted to tell Dave, for instance, that he should bathe more often.

As endlessly fascinating as all this undoubtedly remains to the huddled internet masses yearning to be free (of Dave Winer), the existence of a Supreme Being was proven tangentially by the quote with which eWeek writer Matthew Broersma chose to close his article.

"'Some things, I used to think, are even beneath Dave Winer. But no, I take that back,' wrote blogger Jeneane Sessum."

An anonymous source close to Ms. Sessum reported hearing her remark, after reading the article, "There is a God!"

Despite this admittedly compelling evidence, there will of course be those who seek other explanations. Or at least other, if more temporary, remedies.

taken from a brief history of amerikan pharmaceutical psychosis

was this insightful & hard hitting cultural analysis useful?