Yeah, all the Friedman bashing is me; my next book, coming out in August, includes about 10,000 words on how much of a douchebag the fellow is.
Incidentally, if you have any interest in helping to discredit people such as Friedman, or in participating in an experimental but quite viable distributed conspiracy against a large number of the major outlets, you should take a moment to read about Project PM. Briefly, it consists of two networks which I've designed to better facilitate information flow and collaboration - one is made up of bloggers and journalists who work at least partly online (so far these members range from somewhat obscure political bloggers on the one hand to folks like Newsweek's former Baghdad correspondent Michael Hastings - who quit out of disgust - on the other), and the second network is a sort of online legislature that will be set up in a rather unique way and which will be (in fact, has already begun) carrying out our goals. This latter network consists of about 50 participants thus far (which will increase quite a bit soon when the formal manifesto runs early next month in either Vanity Fair or Wired), consisting of academics, hackers (real ones), assorted media folk, lawyers, financial types, political activists, and other random things. Joining would entail no time commitment whatsoever, but on the other hand would give you the chance to influence a self-perpetuating, quickly-growing entity of the sort that has never existed before and which I and many others have determined to be a viable manner by which to cause at least a small degree of desirable and fundamental change with respect to how crucial information flows throughout the de facto news infrastructure of the U.S. More importantly, we hope to prompt more people to start thinking about the unprecedented options that are now collectively available to clever, honest individuals who would like to take responsibility for the future in a way that actually promises results.
We're still waiting for our software to be completed, at which point the project will launch officially and most everything will be overseen by this legislature. Until then (August or so), we are operating somewhat informally with all decisions being handled by myself and a dozen or so of our more resourceful participants, who are collaborating mostly via shared Google docs (the newest version is pretty awesome, by the way, as it allows for real-time editing of docs by multiple users). And by virtue of your obvious talents, you could almost certainly provide some clever solutions to a couple of the specifics that remain to be hammered out regarding how our little pseudo-republic will operate on a day-to-day basis. And to the extent that your ideas prove convincing, you would have access to a great number of brilliant participants who could assist in implementing them, not to mention our media/blogging arm which already has a combined monthly audience of several hundred thousand relatively high-information citizens. It would be something like playing Liberal Crime Squad except the graphics would be slightly better and we probably won't be prostituting ourselves or turning TV execs into sleepers.
Anyway, you're obviously quite a busy fellow with a lot on his plate, so of course I understand if you decline, but the invitation remains open, and again, any input you might have into any of this would be appreciated and given particular consideration, as much of the thinking that goes into your particular brand of output is happily compatible with the sort of thinking we need. Let me know if you'd like to see a sort of experimental example of one of our sub-projects, the Africa Development Program, which is being run largely by our legal and financial folks and which may be viewed via a shared Google Doc. I'd also be happy to answer any questions you may have via e-mail or phone; my contact info is below.
Slightly related - would you be interested in doing a short e-mail interview? I've been meaning to do at least one piece on DF and its various implications, probably for one of the bigger U.S. mags (non-gaming or tech, I'm thinking The Atlantic or at least its website), otherwise just a single piece to be run on both True/Slant and Huffington Post (the latter has appropriate sub-sections). I would only need a couple short quotes from you, and promise that these would not be the sort of questions you usually receive.
At any rate, thanks for hearing me out, and double thanks for Dwarf Fortress, which is an unprecedented masterpiece.
They'll graduate to dwarf play in no time! I think I've recognize
some of your articles (unless there are various Barrett Browns).t
Definitely one of the Thomas Friedman ones, he he he.