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The headline had me cringing in expectation for a brain dead article, but how stupid of me! It's fricking William Gibson. Almost everything he said in this arti
by jere 14y ago
The headline had me cringing in expectation for a brain dead article, but how stupid of me! It's fricking William Gibson. Almost everything he said in this article seems to be spot on, then and now.
In case you have any remaining worry that Gibson is some crotchety "get of my lawn" type, check him out on twitter. He is one the most prolific, bizarre, and interesting users I follow: https://twitter.com/GreatDismal https://twitter.com/GreatDismal Recent examples:
>Once saw fake Zippo lighters with Confederate flags with swastikas in Shinjuku. Mindless mashup getting it right anyway.
>I've had the tv-in-the-mirror in bathrooms of a few hotel rooms. Have never turned one on. Feels like bad sci-fi prop-design.
>Fellatio illegal in 11 states. Lawmakers afraid to risk being known ever after as "the blowjob senator", if they act to strike them down?
- eksith 14y agoThe level of prescience is astounding and this is almost 17 years ago.
- NoPiece 14y agoNew York Times experimenting with link-bait headlines back in 1996.
- dasil003 14y agoLink-bait is just a new word, the phenomenon must date back to the invention of the printing press.
- hayksaakian 14y agoArguably, printed materials gave you more context along with the title, without opening up the full article.
- dasil003 14y agoSeeing the link is akin to passing the newsstand from a medium distance. Clicking the link is akin to picking up the newspaper and seeing the small print. Skipping the ad is akin to opening the newspaper to the continuation of the story inside.
- shawn-butler 14y agoPamphleteering: http://www.thepamphleteers.com/overview.htm http://www.thepamphleteers.com/overview.htm But I think the most relevant artifacts are what were referred to as "broadsides" Explosive or dramatic one pagers were printed (often as advertisements) and pasted on sides of buildings usually at night under the safety of darkness. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Street_literature http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Street_literature
- angrycoder 14y ago> link-bait headlines Otherwise known as headlines.
- kmfrk 14y agoIt still makes me kind of wistful considering how their headlines today are usually completely anodyne to the point of euphemism, which it sound like the author was in some Valium-induced fugue state.
- Chris2048 14y agoI had to look up a lot of the words you used in this sentence.
- subsystem 14y agoIf you havn't already seen it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Maps_for_These_Territories http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Maps_for_These_Territories http://archive.org/details/NoMapsForTheseTerritories http://archive.org/details/NoMapsForTheseTerritories
- FajitaNachos 14y agoThe swastika symbol in Japan is the sign for a temple. It was used in Japan and many other cultures well before the Nazis adopted it. /end off topic reply