Subject: Re: Favor Regarding Robert Stacy McCain |
From: Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com> |
Date: 2/19/10, 16:00 |
To: Spencer Ackerman <sackerman@washingtonindependent.com> |
Hi, Spencer-
Barrett Brown here; you may recall that we spoke last year about Martin Peretz, on whom I wrote a chapter for my upcoming book. Thanks again for your input on that.
I'm launching a project with the intention of bringing greater attention to the failures of certain parties amongst the mainstream media, such as Thomas Friedman, Charles Krauthammer, Richard Cohen, Howard Kurtz, David Broder, and those who still employ them despite their backlog of failed predictions, poor analysis, contradictory musings, and all the rest; to a lesser extent, we'll also be going after such prominent bloggers as Michelle Malkin, Glenn Reynolds, the Powerline gang, and everyone else who gets to go on the ol' teevee despite their nonsensical and occasionally genocidal output. All of this is to be accomplished by way of an invitation-only network of bloggers who will be asked to coordinate on occasion in order to reach the critical mass necessary to prompt certain mainstream media outlets to cover a given travesty - Friedman's record of terrible predictions, for instance. As it is now, when one of us point out the demonstrable failures of some respected pundit, a couple people might link to it, but for the most part we're only reaching people who are already relatively savvy and well-informed and who thus aren't particularly susceptible to flawed commentary to begin with. On the other hand, if we take advantage of the manner in which at least some editors and reporters with the traditional pubs are likely to address a topic if it's being talked about by a great number of bloggers at once, we can use the "herd dynamics" of the media in such a way as to reach those who consume information largely from print and television - which is to say, a relatively huge number of people who would benefit more from learning that their favorite pundit has no idea what he's talking about. This will all be facilitated by software that a friend of mine is writing and which will be released under an open-source license upon completion, and which will involve significant improvements to the means by which bloggers acquire, evaluate, and disseminate important pieces of information, among several other features that we expect to be of some assistance to both bloggers and their readers.
I mentioned the project briefly in my most recent piece for Vanity Fair and will be making a more formal announcement on Huffington Post, True/Slant, and Daily Kos soon. I've only done a little bit of recruiting on the hush-hush at this point, but so far I've got Allison Kilkenny, Charles Johnson (he's very reasonable now), the fellows at Instaputz, and a few other folks on board; Juan Cole is considering joining up as well, as are a couple of other commentators I've spoken to over the past couple of weeks as well a few non-writers with useful skill sets (political organizers/activists, programmers, etc). I'm also meeting with the execs of True/Slant on Wednesday, as they're interested in promoting the project and perhaps adopting the software across their network, among other things. All in all, we think this is a viable means by which to help reduce the influence of those commentators who have contributed to the national decline by way of their undeserved influence over the electorate while also increasing the influence of those commentators - mostly bloggers - who have shown themselves to be intellectually honest and insightful.
If you'd be interested in getting involved, please let me know, as I'd like to have you on board if possible, and hopefully list you as a participant when I make the formal announcement; we could really use someone who specializes in military, security, and related subjects. More details will be forthcoming when I have that piece published (I may wait till after the meeting on Wednesday to run it), but in the meantime I can answer any questions you may have, and would also like your input on any features you'd like to see from the software or any ideas you may have regarding the project in general. E-mail me back or give me a call at your convenience if you think this is something in which you might like to participate.
Thanks,
Barrett Brown
Brooklyn, NY
512-560-2302