On Dotcom 2.0 & Hyperbolic Media Surfaces…
How Dotcom 2.0 Will Destroy Traditional Media
So Then
Haven’t felt inspired by any Cluster-ish stuff for a while, so have been concentrating my writing energies elsewere: mostly on the occasional piece on BigShinyThing. Some of those posts should probably get elaboration here, as they rapidly get too abstract for the audience over there to be much interested in them, I suspect. Stuff about channels, brands and content which might get somewhere eventually: I’m interested in watching what happens to that trinity as networked individualism (Barry Wellman’s phrase, not mine) really sinks in… Closer to home, I’ve also been hacking at some blog tools, some of which have already …
World Media
The world’s TV networks are still skulking around. No sign of them to the casual glance, but walk anywhere around the backstreets of Aldgate, and the satellite uplink vans are parked three deep… and yes, those Coke ‘love’ posters are on every billboard in the area. Nice.
2 Days Later
The weeks after the subway attacks in 1995, Tokyo was a city living on rumour and nerves. Armed police on every street corner, wild stories of hidden Russian tanks and helicopters ready to spray death across the city. The Friday after the atrocity, rumours of more attacks spread like wildfire — people left the city in droves, my friends bulk-buying tickets out and offering them to anyone who wanted to leave. We stayed. It was a beautiful Spring evening, pink blossom in Aaoyama. Nothing happened. London, two days after the bombs, seems psychically back to its old self. True there …
Aftermath
Walked home yesterday afternoon, against a tide of people walking out of the City. Very zombie movie — emergency vehicles screaming past, jams of traffic followed by empty streets, mobile phones dead. All the buses corralled in sidestreet, strangely drivers still respecting the bus lanes. People at bus stops pissed off that there were no buses — hadn’t they heard the news? By 8 in the evening, everything apparently back to normal, even near Aldgate, although the station was locked and crime scene posted. Feeling restless we went out for a drink in Hoxton — British resilience on display: all …
London Bombing
11:00 We’re OK. I’m at Anne-Fay’s place in Dalston, Helen is on her way to Paris on Eurostar. All tube lines shut down, all buses, possibly all trains into London (rumour). Latest report is at least 20 dead. Aldgate and Aldgate East, which are my local stations, just around the corner from my house, look on TV to be completely shut down with emergency vehicles everywhere. Mobile networks and lines out of the UK overloaded or shut down (to avoid remote-triggering of more bombs? It’s a rumour). Not attempting to get home any time soon. Bad memories of Tokyo. Trying …
Summer at Last
Finally a couple of sunny days in a row. Sitting out in the shade after painting the terrace (again, finally). Busy few days — flew up to Edinburgh on Friday to take a brief from Leith, which was my first flight from City Airport. Only about 15 minutes by car from here, check-in 30 minutes before flying, which mean that for an 0800 flight I could get up at 6am and still make it. And fabulous view from window seat banking out over docklands on the way up, beautiful adagio cloudscapes over the Thames estuary flying back in the evening. …