Category: General

Apparently the quote from this aritcle says “Compared to Twitter Plurk seems to appeal more to non-tech inclined people.” The English version is still being worked on, but I gave a fairly comprehensive interview on Twitter and Plurk. Also in the article (and some of these names are familiar to me, top names from the Indian blogging scene) Gaurav Mishra of Gauravanomics, Patrix (Desipundit) and the author of the article is Debashish Chakrabarty (known as the founder of Indibloggies). I’m sure I’ve covered Indibloggies before, they were the first Indian blogging awards, and they always find some amazing sites.

There’s been a debate/ discussion raging this week around race online. It started with Loren Feldman’s 12 month old “Tech Nigga” video then went in various directions, including an appalling example of racism targeted at SheGeek’s Corvida during a YLive show.

I’ve not long finished this weeks things you can’t say on the Internet podcast, and the subject came up. I haven’t heard the recording yet, but before it comes out I’d like to clarify my stance on the subject, as bite size chunks in a podcast probably won’t do it justice.

Loren Feldman

The one thing that has me beat about the whole Tech Nigga story is that it’s an old one that has come up again. I understand and respect that Loren was trying to make a point about the lack of African American tech bloggers. It offended people, and I believe at the time he apologized for offending people. We all make mistakes, and I’m sure Loren will never make a similar video again.

As I noted in the podcast though, I don’t understand why this is different from say an Ali-G type send up. The lines are very much blurred. However I respect that people find the video offensive, and as such I believe they have the right to say so.

But lets be very clear on one thing: Loren Feldman is not a racist. I spent two days with him in New York with 2006, and this was the mix, myself (white, but Australian), Loren (New Yorker + Jewish) and Chatreuse (African-American). The only time I can even remotely recall anything regarding race coming from Loren’s mouth may have been a self-depreciating joke about his Jewishness. By all means, say he lacks taste at time (as do the best of us at times) and someone who makes mistakes, but don’t call him a racist, he’s not, and anyone who knows him knows that he’s not as well.

American race relations

I noted in the podcast, as I know I have elsewhere before, that America’s obsession with race has always struck me as being strange as an Australian. The concept of Asian-American, African-American, even Irish-American…I don’t get it, and I never will. In Australia people don’t generally call themselves Asian-Australians, Italian-Australians, English-Australians…I’m not saying that some people don’t, but it’s not a regular thing here. Ask most people of any ethnic background here who they are, and they’ll just tell you they are Australian. My grandparents on my fathers side migrated here from Scotland, I don’t regard myself Scottish-Australian, and I’ve never once referred to myself in that way.

I respect that people are, and can be proud of their cultural heritage, but I wonder whether this some-what obsession with what makes people different is in part contributing to the continuation of the racism that drives us apart. What’s wrong with American’s simply being American, irrespective of the color of their skin? A society that values its shared nationality today over its divided past will more quickly overcome the evils of racism. We are, after all, all people.

African-Americans and tech

One thing we discussed in the podcast was the lack of African-Americans in tech. This was one of the original points Loren was trying to make. It’s real, and that some would suggest that saying so is racist itself is beyond me. It’s true. The only African-American I’ve seen on most of my trips in the last 12 months to the US was MC Hammer. The mix is always white, Asian and Indian.

I can’t even pretend I have an answer here, or even whether this should be addressed. That debate is for others, but don’t let calls of racism cloud facts.

Colorblindness and the blogosphere

Getting back to matters race, I’ll repeat what I said in the podcast: I really don’t care what color, sexuality, gender or nationality you are. I remember someone on FriendFeed the other day asking people to forgive him because English wasn’t his first language. I didn’t even know until he said so. I didn’t know Corvida was an African-American Lesbian until she said so, and I really don’t care that she is. I’ve always judged people as I meet them, online and off, and I’ll judge the value of people through their writings or contribution to the conversation. Despite this current obsession with race, in my experience the majority, but not all people, think along the same lines.

Glass Ceilings

If you want to talk about disadvantage, I got to where I was today after spending 10 years in country Western Australia. I might as well have been in timbuktu or the North Pole. The blogosphere has always been in a strong part a meritocracy. Not perfectly, particularly these days at the top and with the power a few people hold, but it still in a large part is. Blogging rewards hard work and a well spoken word, irrespective of race or any other criteria.

That’s pretty much my two cents worth. It distresses me to see people like Wayne Sutton, Corvida and others upset in this current debate, and the YLive thing is appalling. However, lets take a deep breath and look for ways everyone can get a fair go in the blogosphere, irrespective of race, religion, sexuality or nationality. We have far more in common than we have which is different. Lets obsess about the positives and moving forward.

I finally have some dates booked for August.

I’ll be in Seattle for my first ever Gnomedex from the afternoon of August 18 through to August 25. I’ll be in Los Angeles from the afternoon of August 25 until late night August 27.

Why the stopoever? Did you know Qantas allows one free stopover if you do a US booking? I’d read it before when making bookings but I could never work out how to book one…now I did. I picked LA because I’ve never been there aside from the airport to and from Vegas. The other two choices were Hawaii or Vancover…I know, LA is an odd choice, but you’ve got to do it once.

If anyone wants a meet up when I’m in Seattle let me know. I plan on playing tourist for at least 1 day in LA, but I hopefully will get to meet up with a few people (yes Sean Percival, I’m thinking of you) as well for the short time I’m there. I might even have to rock up at Mahalo for a tour! 🙂

Update: I should have added, tickets are still available for Gnomedex here. Attendees list also on the same page, great list of people, most I’ve never met.

I’ve had a lot of questions following yesterdays announcement, and I’ve tried to respond to all of them where I can (the direct ones anyway, haven’t worked through the comments yet). Ed Sutherland at Problogging News wanted to interview me so I responded to his questions; there was a slightly odd angle but I never gave it a second though, and it resulted in this post.

I’m don’t hate it, but his angle seems to be trying to whip up some scandal or controversy where there really isn’t one.

For the record here’s my actual responses to Ed, you’d note the how the full response wasn’t used and instead bits were picked: fair call I guess reporting wise.

Hi Duncan,

Since you’ve left TC, I had a few questions for a piece I’m writing at PBN.

Michael Arrington kiddingly said Inquistr will compete with TC – will it? Or, do TC bloggers agree to some sort of non-compete?

He was joking. Only completely insane people think they can compete with TC, besides that the site isn’t strictly tech, it’s pop culture and odd/ funny stories as well. I was essentially a contractor as opposed to an employee, so no, I’ve never signed a non-compete, the full time staff may have non-competes, to be honest I don’t know.

Do you know who will fill your shoes at TC? Schonfeld is the most recent addition, but Arrington and a few other bloggers are writing there now.

Jason Kincaid started just before I tendered my resignation a month ago, he’s young and still a little raw but he has a lot of potential. I’m not sure what Michael’s plans are in terms of hiring someone else: when I started I was the only f/t writer besides Michael (Nick Gonzales did write, but he also did tech/ coding for TC as well), and now there’s Mark, Jason and Erick, and a couple of occasional guest writers (including me).

Is TC like Gawker in that there is base pay plus advances based on traffic bloggers generate?
Not at all. I was always paid a flat rate per month irrespective of the traffic. There’s obviously a culture that encourages success, be that with traffic, Digg mentions, Techmeme, even Yahoo Buzz and Yahoo itself (I managed a story on the front page of Yahoo once, insane). Michael has always had a strong emphasis on quality and originality: sure, the site covers major news that others are covering, but if you watch it carefully you’ll see it still covers startups other people haven’t covered, it still covers funding announcements first, and it still breaks a lot of news.

I’ve been watching the whole Troy Buswell, chair sniffing scandal from afar, having left WA in February.

For those not familiar with the story, WA Liberal leader Troy Buswell, having managed to become party leader last year despite a “bra-snapping” scandal, was exposed as a chair sniffer. The short version is that Troy apparently sniffed the chair of a female staffer, then apparently crawled around on the floor, all while completely sober.

I’ve met Troy, his wife, his family, even been to his house. She who must be obeyed helped Troy roll the sitting member for Vasse a couple of years back so he could enter Parliament.

Troy would be one of the most talented politicians I’ve ever seen speak, and I’ve seen a bloody lot during my time in politics, including even Clinton back in 96 and William Hague in 98. His ability to capture an audience has always been first class, and as the record shows much of his rise to the leadership was off the back of his stellar parliamentary performances.

But there was always a dark side to Troy. We learnt very early on that his ambition and greed for power were unfortunately his overwhelming driver. He slowly turned on or failed to support those who had supported him along the way. Over time my opinion of him diminished significantly, from one of awe and deep respect to one of disgust. They say loyalty means nothing in politics, but in my experience good politicians remain true to their base, and never forget those who helped them along the way.

So today, in Perth, probably by the time you read this (I’ll update the post later) Troy is facing a spill in the party room. He claims that he still has the numbers and he will live on. Even in political death, Troy has once again shown that his lust for power and position is more powerful than honour and doing the right thing.

The right thing is that Troy should resign.

Imagine the 2009 WA election campaign with the Opposition being headed up by Troy Buswell. Imagine the fun the Labor Party will have with chair sniffing attack ads. Here’s the key: the bra-snapping might have been a drunken lark, but chair sniffing is down right creepy and the people of WA will know that. More importantly female voters en-masse will flock to the ALP when presented with a creepy chair sniffer as the alternative Premier of the State. Simply Troy is now tarnished goods, and there is absolutely no amount of spin that can save him in the eyes of the electorate.

Of course the alternative Liberal Leader is a rather interesting choice: Steve Thomas, the vet from Donnybrook. I thought he was an awful candidate for the seat of Capel, but much to the surprise of many in the South West he’s worked extremely hard and actually turned out to be a really good, honest hard working member of Parliament. But there are Skeletons in his closet as well, no chair sniffing incidents that I’m aware of, but lets just say Steve on the piss is one of the more interesting things I’ve seen in my life. Having said that hard drinking is a badge of honour in WA, if and when the stories come out they’ll probably help give him a boost in the polls.

Nearly a week in and slowly getting the hang of things, might try some higher-rez stuff next week. In case you haven’t dropped by yet, I’ve devised a cure for cancer and bought peace to the world….or not.

Hangover Cures
Linux
Open Source
Canvas for WordPress
Blockbuster & Circuit City

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