Notes & Links by Casey A. Gollan on
art, design, creativity and technology on
the internet

It happens that I have strong feelings about the use of [sic]. Hackish writers deploy this routinely to make whoever they are quoting look stupid. It’s a very cheap move, and a sure sign, in my view, of third-tier writing. It’s acceptable to use [sic] if there’s no way around it, and it’s sometimes excusable to use it if you’re trying to underscore the sloppiness, or stupidity, or whatever, of some powerful figure — if the president of an Ivy League school made a glaring mistake in some official context, maybe that would get a pass. But in general, [sic] is a cheap move — we all make mistakes, typos, little glitches, that mean nothing. This web site is full of such errors — for all I know this post will contain such errors, because I’m writing it quickly, and I don’t have a proofreader, etc. In other words, I’m no different than the person I quoted making some workaday, meaningless error.

The future of the internet goes to whosoever is able to make all of this information work for the benefit of people out there who have all types of issues and are trying to find things. People who are standing out there on the corner of 44th st and 5th ave and it’s their mother’s birthday in two weeks and they know it, and their computer knows it and their addresses, and also knows that their tastes are such that there are three scarves that are actually in the inventory at Saks Fifth Avenue and if she just walks up five blocks, she can get that for her. If you are able to solve problems for people that will be immensely useful for people.

The alchemy of good curating amounts to this: sometimes placing one work of art near another makes one and one equal three. Two artworks arranged alchemically leave each intact, transform both and create a third thing. This third thing and the two original things then trigger cascades of thought and reaction; you know things you didn’t know you needed to know until you know them; then you can’t imagine ever not knowing them again. Then these things transform all the other things and thoughts you’ve had. This chain-reaction is thrilling and uncanny.

Coatney said Newsweek’s Tumblr (which now has more than 11,000 followers) grew in popularity when he stopped simply pulling in RSS feeds and started to hand-select content for it. When he posted some content from Newsweek.com and some from a variety of other sites, the Tumblr seemed less promotional and more personal. And in doing so, he let people know that there’s a person behind the account.

“I think the common mistake is to treat Tumblr solely as a promotional vehicle to get people back to your site,” said Coatney, who used the Newsweek Tumblr to respond to criticism about the magazine.

The internet is made of people. People matter. This includes you. Stop trying to sell everything about yourself to everyone. Don’t just hammer away and repeat and talk at people—talk TO people. It’s organic. Make stuff for the internet that matters to you, even if it seems stupid. Do it because it’s good and feels important. Put up more cat pictures. Make more songs. Show your doodles. Give things away and take things that are free. Look at what other people are doing, not to compete, imitate, or compare … but because you enjoy looking at the things other people make. Don’t shove yourself into that tiny, airless box called a brand—tiny, airless boxes are for trinkets and dead people.

Soon enough, Assange must confront the paradox of his creation: the thing that he seems to detest most—power without accountability—is encoded in the site’s DNA, and will only become more pronounced as WikiLeaks evolves into a real institution.

Never before has the technological, mobile experience of a continuous Now been so crucial in determining the identity and the zeitgeist of a time that seems to exist beyond Time. And so instead of calling it Altermodernity or Atemporaldernity, I have thought of calling it Nowdernity.

Our sensorial experience of time and space is shifting due to a feeling of increased mobility and the technological sensation of an always on that takes connection everywhere: it’s always now, it’s always here.