As some readers know, the Mister Trippy blog was something I originally ran on MySpace. I was interested in exploring web 2.0 and that blog was one of the ways I did this. Eventually I deleted my MySpace profile, although a couple of cloned versions are still around. I also deleted my Bebo account because I found it boring. I’m still on Facebook although I don’t much like it… it seems like Twitter but for those who prefer to interface with computers rather than mobile phones. The key function on Facebook is the status, update it frequently and you’re a true Facebooker!
Recently there have been a couple of Facebook 24 hour blackouts organised to protest about the way FB treats those who use its service; i.e. suspending accounts without explanation etc. The most recent blackout in the middle of December 2008 appears to have been supported by several million FB users who refrained from logging on to their accounts over the designated period. When I deleted my MySpace accounts (I had m0re than a dozen) I encouraged others to do the same thing, but what mostly happened was people kept their MS accounts, with some also following me onto Facebook (some had been there before me too). It shouldn’t need saying these social networking sites don’t exist to serve us, but rather to gather data on us and deliver us up to advertisers. Therefore it is a bad idea to get too tied into any of them because there is no guarantee they’ll maintain the ‘service’ they offer. That’s one reason why I’ve now put this blog on here, aside from wanting to make my own site more Web 2.0. At the same time I prefer to bypass certain elements of Web 2.0, like click-thru advertising. For me, our own blogs on our own sites is the way forward to Web 2.1. I think it’s better for us to blog on our own sites rather than on the WordPress site because it keeps us decentralised; but if you haven’t got your own site, then go to WordPress.
The latest anti-Facebook sensation on FB is a “mass suicide” in the form of an organised mass account deletion. I like the basic idea, but the term mass suicide is a bad tactical error, it is too closely bound up with nutzoid cults to be worth using. Headlining it as a mass deletion might have meant less attention, but would have been an infinitesimally preferable syntactical choice. An even worse mistake was the decision to hype this ‘anti-event’ as “The Facebook Final Solution”. Realistically I don’t think it will garner a fraction of the support enjoyed by the 24 hour blackouts, and I’ll keep my account for now so I can continue to support the latter activity.
This how the organisers of the “Mass Suicide” describe their event: “FBMS – Facebook Mass Suicide. The Facebook Final Solution. Event Info Host: Internet. Type: Other – Ceremony. Network: Global. Time and Place Date: Wednesday, February 4, 2009. Time: 12:00am – 11:55pm. Location: Everywhere. On February 4th every participant to this group will deactivate his own Facebook account by committing a ritual-synchronized mass suicide. In conjunction with the fifth Facebook anniversary the participants will choose suicide strategy declaring their independence from controlled and pervading social-emotional cliché. Join us!”
Today’s blog as I originally created it ended here. But I now feel the need to add a coda. Far more exciting than the above proposal is the way in which the precognition and ESP experiments I’ve been secretly engaged in are bearing fruit. They were secret because I hadn’t told Michael K I’d been trying to form a mesmeric link to his mind. I’ve been writing my blogs the day before I post them and then using mesmerics to project the content into K’s mind. The idea being that although he’s on the other side of the Atlantic right now, he’ll leave comments on the blogs I’ve just posted that actually apply to the blog I’ve just written but won’t post for around 24 hours. Now check this comment that K left on yesterday’s blog:
“I fell thru a wormwhole and ended up at the 14 Hour Technicolor Dream because a UK cyberfriend, who I actually like, invited me to join Facebook. I’ve also found one or two people I haven’t talked to in years on Facebook, and wish I’d never met them again.
“Never paid a cent to join. Never bought anything through the site. Never bought anything advertised on the site.
“Overall, I find it MUCH less interesting than MySpace, mostly because people only link up with folks they already know. Pointless. I tried to make friends withan attractive stranger who was a fan of the Renaissance painter Massaccio and she responded to me “Excuse me, do I know you?” I mean, FUCK OFF!
“Personally, it doesn’t bother me that much that a bunch of rich, goofball righty militarist futurists out to abolish reality and enslave the universe own this thing. Sounds like Chicken Little panic. If the CIA wants to know that I listen to the Fall, watch Plan 9 From Outer Space and root for the New York Giants, they can call and ask me. I don’t really care if they know.
“Nor does it really bother me that a bunch of even loonier hedge funds and venture capitalists want to throw money at these guys. Remember the Internet bubble?
“Overall, it’s pretty naff and seems populated by wingnuts who like to send each other cyber-cheesecakes and give each other cyber-noogies. But Tom Hodgkinson needs to get some perspective, remove the duct tape from his window frames and take a deep breath.”
What is really exciting about this precognitive post is that it is almost a word for word re-post of a comment K left on the Trippy blog a couple of years back when I was running it on MySpace. Then it was a response to my re-posting of an article by Tom Hodgkinson about how Facebook was used for Data Mining…. Like wow, before you know it Michael will have full recall of that incident with that basket of skinhead gear and the dead pea fowl in the Charing X Station that happened to me rather than him! And this won’t be because we are different schizophrenic manifestations of the same personality, but because we are genuinely psychic! Try the mesmeric link baby, it’s a groove sensation!
And while you’re at it don’t forget to check – http://www.stewarthomesociety.org/ – you know it makes (no) sense!
Comments
Comment by Massacciofan on 2009-01-07 08:48:38 +0000
Excuse me, do I know you?
Comment by John Eden on 2009-01-07 10:04:39 +0000
Interesting about the protests on Facebook (I’m not on it so I wouldn’t know otherwise). I’m interested in social networking sites as perhaps a way of regulating the way people doss about at work.
Myspace and facebook are banned in my workplace, but it seems like for a lot of people it is their default way of procrastinating or trying to take back their time.
All of these things are a negotiation – what can we get out of it? I’ve found Myspace good for contacting people about music etc. I also use it to drive traffic to my site by having a widget on my myspace page showing the title of my uncarved.org blog posts rather than blogging on myspace.
I agree that having your own site is preferable but not everyone has the money or technical skill to sort out their own domain etc.
Comment by PronetoClone on 2009-01-07 11:21:35 +0000
Michael K. Trippy, will you tell us about your StumbleUpon experience?
Comment by marmitelover on 2009-01-07 15:58:19 +0000
Michael K’s comments reflect the argument I have just had with the activist samba band rhythms of resistance. RoR are not doing very well, with falling membership, enthusiasm and attendance, mainly because they haven’t had a proper rehearsal space.
So I, without recourse to the interminable anarchist meetings, struck out on my own and set up a facebook RoR group, inviting members who were already on facebook.
This caused uproar and I ended up leaving the band! But,hehe, I still manage the facebook RoR group so in effect I am now the leader of a breakaway RoR sect.
Anyway, my argument was that who gives a toss if the CIA owns it, tracks it or whatever. So they’ll get to find out that I’m interested in remote viewing, spirals, Judy Garland and wood fires. Big deal.
The identikit anarcho punks of RoR got really offended when I suggested that that CIA might not find them as subversive and dangerous as they imagined. In fact, as it’s an open band, CIA or MI5 could join. I joked, let’s hope they have rhythm!
In the end, wading through dreary crapola arguments, I ‘lost it’ around Christmas and told them, on their list (no doubt tracked by the secret service) to shove it up their collective (big c and little c) arses.
Comment by marmitelover on 2009-01-07 16:01:16 +0000
Actually I should write about this on my own blog. I do things in the middle of the night, cause trouble generally and then forget about it in the morning when it is all very worthwhile stuff!
Comment by PronetoClone on 2009-01-07 16:29:20 +0000
ty, Michael
Comment by Dialogue on 2009-01-07 17:04:21 +0000
Dialogue
with the Dead
The Monument to the
Political Martyrs,
Nunhead Cemetery,
3pm Sunday, 11th January 2009
For those who would like to engage in this on a
full stomach, meet for lunch from 1 pm at:
The Old Nun’s Head
15 Nunhead Green, SE15 3QQ
Overground: Nunhead or Peckham Rye
Comment by Dialogue on 2009-01-07 17:05:19 +0000
This is the first of a series of opportunities to overcome any
obstacles that may block a free and frank dialogue between
yourself and those who have passed away.
The world promises to be a very different place in 2012, and
those of us who have already developed channels of
communication with the dead will feel more comfortable in an
environment when this turns out to be an everyday
experience.
“The experience of all ages should have taught our rulers that
persecution can never efface principles. Individuals may
perish but the truth is eternal.”
Joseph Gerrald (1763 – 1796)
Like many people, you may already have experienced
communications from the dead. However, we aim to make this
a two way process, a true dialogue.
The End of Capitalism is Nigh, but the transition towards free
communism may well prove traumatic and will necessitate
major psychological adjustments. Minus 3 is a self-help group
which aims to smooth this transition, help minimise the
trauma and ensure as many people as possible live to enjoy the
rosy dawn of free communism.
Our Dialogue with the Dead programme is merely one
element of a smorgasbord of measaures to acheive these aims.
Comment by Vivian Kilbride on 2009-01-07 17:24:52 +0000
I had a great day during the Facebook Blackout. Lunch with a friend, dinner with a friend, and a top shag (with another Facebook user). I was thinking about this in Tesco earlier and wondering what to do about Facebook. I had a really boring time on Myspace but on FB I have loads of friends I’ve never met and like seeing what they are up to all over the world. I have a fake personalitiy who lives smewhere I’ve never been and now I’m building a small life there and actually want to go there. Spooky synchronicitous things happen all the time; eg people not on FB email me on hotmail or whereever about my status lines often. But it is also a bit infantilising and scatty.
Comment by marmitelover on 2009-01-07 18:24:15 +0000
Vivian, people not on facebook email you about your status? Weird.
Who did you have the shag with?
Dialogue, nunhead way too far.
Comment by mistertrippy on 2009-01-07 19:27:08 +0000
Maybe some of us should try having sex with the dead live on various social networking sites using a web cam and our psychic powers… it could be a groove sensation…. Personally I found MySpace a lot more fun than FB because it is more proletarian… Less fakes profiles, although there are plenty, but FB is definitely where I get more seriously cyber cruised…. I guess because the organise it on the basis of regional networks… And Peckham and the weekend sounds great… But that Stumble Upon might have to wait for another blog…. And I agree with John & marmitelover, what can we get out of it and what are they getting from us? It is definitely a trade off…..
Comment by Mister Trippy on 2009-01-07 19:40:37 +0000
I’ve noticed that, and I also noticed how a lot of “top” bloggers replied to ever comment they got, thus doubling up their commetn count – but i think there is also this hundred monkeys thing where maybe it reaches a point where something new and interesting could happen. I definitely like those feedback loops. But at the same time it often seems like it is the most flimsey unthought thru blogs that get the most comments, or maybe it is just the bloggers spend so much time doing promo to get the blog taking off they don’t have some much time for writing the blog… or it is just the pressure of trying to write every day – or maybe I’m just over fetishising content and should be happy with form…. in a knowing postmodern sort of way…
Comment by mistertrippy on 2009-01-07 19:42:14 +0000
Hey you should be writing as well as deejaying, that’s great, you ought to be doing my cover blurbs and stuff…. and getting the Toms (have you seen how many I’ve got as friends – worst dressed one is Emo Tom, or is it Anti-Gravity Tom because his gear looks worse upside down? – and I’ve only got a fraction of them out there as freinds) to circulate me as the new “cool” person….
Comment by Mister Trippy on 2009-01-07 19:43:05 +0000
I recognise that girl..she’s the girl K and I had a threesome with back in 2004 when they came to hear giive a reading from ‘Down and Out in Shoreditch and Hoxton’ in Highbury and Islington..
hey there were a few of my friends there and they were all getting a bit shirty about these two ‘strangers’ and in the end I went round signing books and when K asked me to sign it as ‘Michael K’, I was a bit worried in case it was some kind of set-up that involved me having to put on the white afro (I’d only just had my hair shaved back and was looking kinda cute) but, as it was, it was all kosher although not entirely vegan…..
Comment by mistertrippy on 2009-01-07 19:43:47 +0000
I agree with pretty much all this, especially MySpace not lasting forever and I kinda like that empheral thing that goes on. You put the blog up and that is the amplic phase, then as profiles get removed its chiselling phase because comments go with them. Its always interesting to see that square with the red cross on your comments page or wherever and it says profile no longer exists and then trying to work out who it belonged too….
Comment by Michael K on 2009-01-07 19:44:26 +0000
You have to be careful how you mike up the cymbols and the hi-hat, they can just cut thru everything when they’re too loud…
Comment by mistertrippy on 2009-01-07 19:45:08 +0000
wow I dig this repetition but if I was going to use it again I’d change the line for you Sharon (okay so on “Hampstead” in his hardcore punk days Adam Ant sang the last name as Maxime but we’ll let it ride, after all this is po-mo “extremism” not “pop quizz”), so anyway, next time (like now and here), it should read: “and sweat dripping from my overused thighs…….” actually maybe we could substitute sweat and then thighs too next time… I like this!
Comment by Mister Trippy on 2009-01-07 19:45:50 +0000
Sounds good, we have the ecstasy of communication (that’s Baudrillard kids, and does anyone actually believe Jean B. is running his own MySpace profile?) and eveyone else is left with the ecstasy of phantasising our communication. I always disliked the transformation of fantasy into phantasy in headshrink literature, but hey I’m on MySpace possibly pretending to be (or not to be) myself….
Comment by Michael K on 2009-01-07 19:47:01 +0000
It’s Ann Ono!! That tongue is inimtable. Can we get her back on Forkbook???? I mean The Joker in Batman???? I mean…here on myspace???? Let me know but until then it’s a case of ‘John, I’m only Sploshing’….
Comment by Mister Trippy on 2009-01-07 19:48:16 +0000
Sometimes I add a pinch of cinammon as it helps to improve the friction between the custard and the boot…and make sure they’re Wellington boots from a reliable manufacturer as it can make all the difference. Price is no consideration when it comes to the best in sploshing!!!!!
Comment by mistertrippy on 2009-01-07 19:49:16 +0000
yeah…this ‘Arm and Hammer’ hat looked a bit ungainly at first when K…I mean…The Joker in Batman…brought it back one night but now I can’t go to the bathroom without it…and I keep on sploshing like there’s no tomorrow!!!!!
Comment by Mister Trippy on 2009-01-07 19:51:02 +0000
Page 2! It’s only a few comments away..and that’ll show K and his cronies who’s officially hacked!!
Comment by Ant-Eater on 2009-01-07 20:22:52 +0000
….come, come
Comment by Vivian Kilbride on 2009-01-07 20:43:46 +0000
It was with one of those people who NEVER HAS A STATUS LINE. I hate them and once deleted 18 of them even though I had hardly any friends at the time. Actually it’s only the status lines that are psychically serious I get emails about. The last one was when I was threatening to go on the game and someone emailed about this great place they’d found to ‘work’ in Sydney, then some other people called to offer me ‘proper’ work – none of them on FB, all in 24 hours.
Comment by Cunt on 2009-01-07 21:38:34 +0000
“This is the stuff of which cults are made.”
– Time Out
Comment by Michael K on 2009-01-07 22:09:56 +0000
I tried WordPress a few times before but only on sites I was doing for others…seems good but needs more customisation (although I’m sure that’s well possible and there are all the themes out there too) but what gets me unhot about it is the things like tagging and the categories and all that stuff…tagging has been around so long now that its usefulness should have become apparent but actually I just find I want to avoid that kind of functionality like the plague…
Comment by Michael K on 2009-01-07 22:18:56 +0000
And as for getting off the corpse networks, well you know I’ve been sploshing about that for years but I’ve had a go at running boards etc elsewhere in The Building and basically it’s just that thing of ending up doing Information Systems work as well as being addicted to commetage when the whole point is content and trying to make any of this pay you so you dont have to do other stuff that distracts from Facebook and Myspace addiction.
Yeah…I know I need help but at least I know I need help and anyway the best of all worlds is to get a meme-groove running through all of these sites like an open razor with attached products that groovers want because they’re a groove but, really, all of this needs to be the subject of some kind of think-tank brain-storming kind of thing (yeah it could be an event but then it would just be all guff and grant-applications instead of being a semantic love-in that is something like the equivalent of one of those gigs that makes everybody want to buy guitars and form bands).
Discipline…discipline that’s what I want to see in here and in the mirror if I ever come off Forkspace long enough to go to the (shared) bathroom (occupied by lesbians who are also into nudism and top-secret Facebooker parties on MySwing)
Comment by Díre McCain on 2009-01-08 04:35:12 +0000
A majority of private grants are awarded by invitation only to organizations that have an established track record. However, opportunities do exist for newer organizations as well. For example, the James Irvine Foundation has a program entitled the New Connections Fund, which is designed to identify nonprofit organizations that are doing exceptional work that aligns with the Foundation’s interests, including Arts and Education. The program awards grants up to $50,000 over a period of one or two years, and is geared toward small to mid-sized organizations with budgets between $100,000 and $2 million. The application process is highly competitive, with funds being granted to only ten to fifteen percent of all applications received.
Comment by Christopher Nosnibor on 2009-01-08 09:53:07 +0000
Yup, there’s a reason I’m not on FB, and despite pressure to sign up, I’m managing to resist and remain an avoider… and I’ve no plans to change that position any time soon. If I want to talk to people I know in real-life, I’ll email them. Or talk to them in person. And I’ve simply not ime for games / apps. Life’s too short, y’know?
Comment by mistertrippy on 2009-01-08 13:21:27 +0000
Hey Mister Nosnibor there’s a big campaign on Facebook to get you to join Facebook, I get about about a dozen Facebook messages a day saying we’ve got to get you on FB…. but I guess you don’t want to spoil the party by actually joining… and I hate all those applications too… Also it is great that after I put this up yesterday and then went on FB about 11 hours later, like nobody had commented on anything I had there or much else, it was like they’d come here instead… or gone to the officially hacked officially faked Mister Trippy site on MySpace….all I had was a few friend requests and like six messages about how we had to get you on Facebook…. leaving Facebook, it’s a groove sensation….
Comment by Mark Suckermann on 2009-01-08 13:46:29 +0000
WARNING: YOUR FORKBOOK ACCOUNT WILL BE DELETED UNLESS YOU GENERATE ME SOME GREENBACKS WITHIN THE NEXT MONTH!
Due to most hedge funds having gone bust and therefore being unable to throw money at me, you’d better earn me some click thru revenue by at least looking at the ads I host. Or else!
Comment by Michael K on 2009-01-08 13:48:22 +0000
Yeah…and some of the additional features on Sploshbook that Chris is missing include the capacity to invite all your friends to a certain group and thereby test your friend-cupboard for the presence of possible sex-partners with a certain bent. For instance, last night, knowing I already had a certain number of friends in the cupboard who are lebians and into nudism, I decided to send them an invitation to joining the group ‘Alchemy-The Royal Art’. This morning…hey presto…I’ve got my eye on a dozen nude lesbians who I can now potentially meet for marathon sex-sessions involving the transmutation of base-metals.
These are the kind of features you’d spend months programming into WordPress so let’s not through the baby out with the sploshwater…
Comment by mistertrippy on 2009-01-08 15:52:25 +0000
I’m a lesbian and I love nudism too…. and I’m into transmuting myself into different genders… it’s a groove sensation baby!
Comment by Díre McCain on 2009-01-08 17:06:41 +0000
S?n rén chéng h?…
Comment by Díre McCain on 2009-01-08 17:07:22 +0000
Ahem, that should read: San rén chéng hu
Comment by marmitelover on 2009-01-08 19:19:44 +0000
I hope you are not talking about my blog when you talk about flimsy unthought-through stuff. I mean some of my posts are kinda flippant but others are reportage, slice of life stuff, and some posts are just observations of London life. I’m no intellectual and actually I can’t bear that kind of writing.
If it’s not transparent I can’t be bothered to read it. The best writers make it easy in my opinion.
Anway I don’t get that many comments myself.
I don’t really promote my blog on facebook because I want to keep it anonymous, sort of. I want to keep me and my persona separate.
Comment by The Real Tessie on 2009-01-08 22:55:38 +0000
Hi honey I’m Home
Comment by mistertrippy on 2009-01-08 23:03:57 +0000
hey marmitelover I don’t think K is referring to you… do you know if he has he ever read your blog? I was just reading McKenzie Wark’s 50 Years of Recuperation and in that he talks about the low level of the blogsphere and I don’t think that’s about your blog either…. just general comments… And actually your blog is much much better than a lot I’ve looked at…. And I can understand why you want to keep yourself separate from you personas….but as you know I am my personas… all 666 of ’em!
Comment by mistertrippy on 2009-01-08 23:18:55 +0000
Hey Tessie trust you to get between me and marmitelover… but hey you’re Talk and I’m Home, we’re not married yet you know….
Comment by Díre McCain on 2009-01-09 02:18:12 +0000
Looky, Chris is here! Didn’t notice him the first time around…
The Function that you are trying to use is disabled and will be back shortly. We are making some minor changes to this section please bear with us until we can get this back online. Please do NOT email me about this. Just wait it out. 2/5/2323 – Tom
Comment by marmitelover on 2009-01-09 07:57:03 +0000
Of course anyone making a little effort can find out who msmarmitelover actually is. And that’s fine. I believe stalking should be rewarded.
I’ve got about 3-4 proper stalkers now and I’m thrilled.
Comment by mistertrippy on 2009-01-09 08:29:24 +0000
There are a lot of marmitelovers out there but this one ain’t just bread, butter and spread…. Yeah and we got Mister Ed here too…. Wow looks like things are gonna really kick off if we can get a few more like The Former Jenny Spanks!
Comment by Díre McCain on 2009-01-10 21:31:01 +0000
She’s too busy spanking _______ (fill in the blanking)
Comment by mistertrippy on 2009-01-10 21:39:35 +0000
That girl is hot and someone’s bottom will be too if that’s what she’s been busy doing…