Recommendations for Cypherpunks Books

Declan McCullagh declan at well.com
Mon Jan 22 07:35:34 PST 2001


On Sun, Jan 21, 2001 at 09:42:14AM -0800, Tim May wrote:
> 
> Declan can comment on this, too, but it's clear that editors like 
> "Hegelian" set-ups of conflict (thesis, antithesis, synthesis). So 
> phrases like "Twilight of the ...." resonate in various ways, both 
> Hegelian and Wagnerian. The phrases suggest "end of an era" when in 
> fact there is no such end.
> 

All true, of course. It's even worse than that: The more a journalist
writes, the more he feels compelled to simplify conflicts and reporting
into what can be described in one short paragraph. Assignment editors
and copy editors generally encourage this trend, and let's face it:
We have a lot of smart people reading our stuff, but a lot of idiots
as well. Simplification sells -- and I'm not even talking about TV!

I find myself struggling against this, and occasionally have to make an
effort to unpack a sentence, to make it more descriptive.

All this is to say that I wouldn't spend too much time worrying about
that Salon article. Parts are true, but others are so simplified as to
be meaningless.

-Declan





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