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Five blind men
Just what is the Internet anyway, and what can you expect of it? Ask a dozen people and get a dozen answers. I'm reminded of the story of the the five (six? seven?) blind wise men who each in turn delivered utterly different descriptions of what an elephant was like after grasping different parts of the animal's anatomy: "An elephant is like a tree!" exclaimed the one who wrapped his arms around a leg, "No, like a snake!" replied the one who grabbed the trunk, and so on. If you ever run a Web site for someone, you'll likely encounter something similar.

I recently put together the beginnings of a nice little site for a monthly newspaper here in Taos, New Mexico. I'd gotten off to a fine start, I thought, by proclaiming a mantra I invented, to wit: "A newspaper is not a Web site, and a Web site is not a newspaper!" What this means to me is that the media are utterly different, so why should one try to be like the other?

A newspaper is something physical: you can hold it in your hand, read it at the breakfast table or in the bathroom, swat flies with it, or crumple it up to start a fire. Its content is static, unchanging (within a single edition), and non-interactive. A Web site, on the other hand, exists as a mostly visual representation of millions of different combinations of zeros and ones. It's more of a concept than a "thing." Some would argue that the information contained in computer code, HTML, and the like is another building block of the universe, a kind of energy, or even a dimension. Whew! What I do know is that anything goes in cyberspace... we can communicate back and forth with words, colors, images, sounds, motion, just about anything.

Same argument, continued (sort of)
My mantra was cleverly conceived to stake out the broadest possible freedom of action for me as a designer. I envisioned the site in question as a new medium or venue for communication and artistic expression. "Whew" again, huh? After all, I'm sitting here right now in TAOS, NEW MEXICO, home, destination-of-choice, or trap for high-powered weirdos of every description. The town sits next to a bleeping rift valley, fergodssakes, where the tectonic plates are pulling farther and farther apart all the time. The earth is trying to open up right here, and practically every hill and hummock is an extinct (dormant?) volcano. Yes, volcano! Not your "Anywhere, U.S.A." kind of place, in other words, for better or worse...

At any rate, the town supposedly has more artists per capita than any other place in the country, in much the same way that New York City or Los Angeles have more actors than any place else. Here in Taos, the guy who reads your gas meter or the waitress in the coffee bar is probably a master woodcarver, jeweler, or drum-maker, and I mean really. The odd thing about the place, though, is that hardly any of these folks actually know each other -- for the most part, they're working and living in isolation. There's no real community here*, you see, just a heap of disparate souls attracted by the mountains and the energy of the rift who occasionally bump into each other at the organic supermarket. Maybe that accounts for all the hugging you see in public places: "JULIA! My GOD, is that YOU?!" It probably also has something to do with the fact that my Web site mantra seems to be falling between the cracks...

To put it another way, I thought I had successfully made the point that a Web site can be so much more than just a bulletin board in cyberspace. Of course, my real motivation was to avoid the dreary task of pasting a lot of boring articles into Web pages. Anyone can do that, right? Instead, I envisioned "instant" photo-journalism, interactive discussion groups, moment-to-moment fun and craziness, lots of ART, MUSIC, and EXCITING STUFF (yay). I thought the site could be a forum for promoting contributors' work in other areas, an energy vortex, a can't-miss place that all the high-zoot artists, teachers, activists, and fiery-eyed alternative esoterica freaks would want to visit and be a part of. I would sit here at the center of everything to implement all the lunacy, having a howling good time, yadda-yadda-yadda. As it turns out, what the publisher wants posted is -- you guessed it -- reports of county commissioners meetings, etc. Ah, reality.

Can you spell c-l-i-e-n-t?
Oh well. At least my imagination and idealism are still intact, and I haven't sold out. I wish I could sell out, actually. The arrangement I have with this operation is that I share office space (and an ISDN line) for free in exchange for uploading a page of daily local news items each day. I don't write the blurbs, just format them nicely and send them on their way, and it hardly takes any time at all. Yes, I also designed the site itself as a barter arrangement, in exchange for the first month and a half of taking up space here, before I got everything off the ground. (Did I mention I was relatively new at this? :-)

The thing is, no one knows what to do with this cauldron of creative potential that's fallen into their laps. I mean, we're talking TAOS, NEW MEXICO!!! -- not "normal" places like, say, Ohio. There's a lot more going on than the usual shenanigans of elected officials, that's for sure (Indians! Hispanos! Anglos! Foreigners! Acid saints! UFOs!). Local muckraking is a valuable service for any town, especially this one, but I have never lived anywhere where the county commissioners weren't bumbling, inbred, parochial, shortsighted, and stingy. There's a moral here, but I'm not sure exactly what it is.

What irks me the most are the preconceptions, both mine and others. In this case my notions are actually in the way: the man wants county commissioner meetings, give 'em to him, obviously. Except that I keep thinking: if I'm not really getting paid, why not blow out the jams? Life as an accursed swine-fool creative type means turning everything into art if you can. Someday, somewhere, someone might care, but that can't be a criterion for success. That comes out of how it makes you feel...

OK, I'm an idiot
Duh.This is hard for me. I'm used to flying solo. And nowadays most people think they don't need a Web site because they're only looking at dollars and cents and aren't excited about starting a revolution. There's also the matter of the revolution having died out already, in some people's minds. That, and the fact that their neighbors' third-grader can build Web sites, so why should they pay me or you? Perilous times, perilous times.

I think we've only begun to scratch the suface. And I don't think the best use of the Internet is to sell crap or help Microsoft take over the world. I also wish John Ashcroft and the High Holy Stiff-Armed Salute Gang weren't doing their damnedest to ruin the whole thing. (Was this a great country or what?!) I'm so tired of seeing love & creative energy squashed out of fear I could write a book about it. Hah!

OK. The monthly paper gets local political news on its Web site, fine. But this boy has other fish to fry and I hope you do, too. I heard Quincy Jones on teevee say that Frank Sinatra told him to live each day as if it were his last and someday he'd be right. (DOUBLE hah!!) Don't let the trogs and weenies get you down, gang. And now, if you'll excuse me, I have some code to write and shibboleths to shred.

Don't you?

Senior Applelinks editor and columnist John H. Farr doesn't have an iPod or the sense he was born with, yet the sun still comes up every morning. Cool!

* Applies mainly to Anglos, of course. Who knows why?

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AUDIO CREDIT: embedded 44k file, European Birds -- Sounds and Sonograms.

DESIGN CREDIT: GRACK! byline graphic by Bob Farr.

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