From: erc@s116.slcslip.indirect.com (Ed Carp [khijol Sysadmin])
Date: Tue, 17 Jan 95 00:53:03 PST
To: tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May)
Subject: Re: Jude Milhon in WIRED
In-Reply-To: <199501161819.KAA14478@netcom19.netcom.com>
Message-ID: <m0rU9dt-0004JdC@s116.slcslip.indirect.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text


> Anyway, many of the folks "Wired" and the other hype-zines interview
> are indeed strange and marginal. To be expected. There are only so
> many of the standard "talking heads" that can be interviewed (the
> stand-bys like Engelbart, Nelson, Toffler, Pournelle, etc.).
> 
> Frankly, I'd rather see a story on "Zippies," about which I'd heard
> nothing substantive before, than Yet Another Ted Nelson Story, about
> which I've heard entirely too much over the past decade. (Not to
> insult Ted--Hi, Ted!--but there are only so many ways to tell the
> Xanadu story...time for new approaches.)
> 
> I know some folks in the crypto/PGP community who were quite miffed
> that such "marginal" folks as Eric Hughes, John Gilmore, and I were
> featured on the cover of "Wired" 1.2 two years ago...they naturally
> saw themselves as being more worthy, as perhaps they were....such is
> life. The "credit assignment problem" in evolution and genetic
> programming remains a tough one.

I'm not sure that that's the case. Just because you move in dramatically
politically incorrect circles (no insult intended) you may tend to get
interviewed more than, say, I would.  The fact that I might be working on
more important or interesting things is completely irrelevent. 
Cypherpunks is 'hot', so the press goes to who are perceived to be the
'movers and shakers' and they are talked to. The people working behind the
scenes on stuff often are ignored in deference to those who are more
visible.  Again, no insult intended, but I think there's a large measure
of truth in it.  The same people keep getting the press while the larger
bulk of the population gets ignored.  It's also geographically-oriented, 
too - the folks on the West Coast tend to get the majority of the press, 
followed by the East Coast.  Anyone in between is basically ignored.  I 
guess the press thinks that no one outside of Silicon Valley or Boston is 
working on anything of any substance.  Hell, look at Linux - that was 
done by a guy in Finland, and a college student at that.  I'll bet that's 
rather embarassing to the "hot shots" in Cupertino :)
-- 
Ed Carp, N7EKG    			Ed.Carp@linux.org, ecarp@netcom.com
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