fauxstor.net

sporadic web manipulation

February 25, 2005

Pay me Not to Blog

In the last week, blogdex has been dominated by Jason Kottke's recent decision to quit his day job and blog full time. I even learned a new word because of it: "micropatronazgo".

I think Jason is a nice guy, and has built some nifty things. But I don't understand why anyone would pay him to blog full time. I am not saying you shouldn't, I just don't understand.

The blogging community loves to snipe at the mainstream media. They love to catch them in lies and cover-ups. They love to catch each other in lies and cover ups. But they hate paying for mainstream media. They don't even like to register for it. "Premium services, my ass!"

Is the idea here that "blogging is legit", and we can reward one of our own? Because the blogging mantra of "information wants to be free" doesn't fly with "I can't wait to pay this guy to blog."

Now, I do understand that Jason's blog still is free, probably always will be. Voluntarism is the bee's knees. But so many bloggers and readers consume so many blogs each day, I don't see how the micropayment system would practically work. It's like in Superman 3 or Office Space, but looking from the other side: they may be micropayments, but if I read 300 blogs a day, it starts adding up.

Perhaps the idea is you only pay for the good bloggers, the one's you really like. Rewarding the best seems like a great idea, except you cannot help but alter the premise of their actions. Jason loves to blog, and would do it full time, except he could not afford to, hence the micropayments. I sincerely believe him, but I think he may find it hard to avoid a sense of obligation. Not that he is doing it for the money, but that many of the the people who contributed expect he is now doing it for them.

And really he should always be doing it for himself.

If one classified a blogger as a full time, non-exempt position, then he or she would blog Monday through Friday, for 8 hours a day, with two 15-minute breaks, and a lunch somewhere in the middle of it. 2,080 hours of blogging a year. One could expect a good 5 posts a day minimum. But most bloggers and webheads don't spend 40 hours a week on the web. They spend 80. So let's bump that to 10 a day. Of course, we all know it's quality, not quantity.

Which is why I post seldomly, and post absolute crap.

And, if you totally disagree with everything I have written, save the "crap" part, you can pay me not to blog.

Posted by justin at 7:39 AM | Comments (4)

February 9, 2005

How much is that Skullhead in the window?

Well, he's not yet for sale, but he does have a full window display at Barneys in New York. It features the likes of Marc Jacobs, Dries Van Noten, Jil Sander, Rick Owens, Duckie Brown, and a wee little (err, 12-inch) Skullhead by Huck Gee. If you don't know who Huck Gee is, take my word that his shit will A SPLODE this year.

From what I can tell, there will be 5 different versions of Huck's Skullhead figure with outfit and shoes designed by each of the above designers. It's not every day you see vinyl toys in the window at Barneys.

Rumour has it that the 12-inch Skullheads should be released around April/May, with a sixth version based on an original design by Huck Gee himself to be released later this year.