mtm1963
01-06-2005, 06:20 AM
WS didn't get mentioned.
Published: January 3, 2005, 6:53 AM PST
By John Schwartz
The New York Times
As the horror of the South Asian tsunami spread and people gathered online to discuss the disaster on sites known as Web logs, or blogs, those of a political bent naturally turned the discussion to their favorite topics.
To some in the blogosphere, it simply had to be the government's fault.
On Democratic Underground, a blog for open discussion and an online gathering place for people who hate the Bush administration, a participant asked, "Since we know that the atmosphere has become contaminated by all the atomic testing, space stuff, electronic stuff, earth pollutants, etc., is it logical to wonder if: Perhaps the 'bones' of our earth where this earthquake spawned have also been affected?"
The cause of the earthquake and resulting killer wave, the writer said, could be the war in Iraq. "You know, we've exploded many millions of tons of ordnance upon this poor planet," the writer said. "All that 'shock and awe' stuff we've just dumped onto the Asian part of this earth--could we have fractured something? Perhaps the earth was just reacting to something that man has done to injure it. The earth is organic, you know. It can be hurt."
The ridicule began immediately. Online insults, referred to colloquially as flames, rose high on other sites.
"What would life be without D.U.?" asked an editor at Wizbang, a politically conservative blog, using the initials of Democratic Underground.
"Get out the tin foil hats," a contributor to the blog wrote.
The interplay between the sites, left and right, is typical of the rumbles in cyberspace between rivals at different ends of the political spectrum. In many ways, Web logs shone after the tsunami struck: bloggers in the regions posted compelling descriptions of the devastation, sometimes by text messages sent from their cellphones as they roamed the countryside looking for friends and family members. And blogs were quick to create links to charities so that people could help online.
But the blogosphere's tendency toward crackpot theorizing and political smackdown could not be suppressed for long.
"It's so much of what they feed on, so much of what they are," said James Surowiecki, the author of "The Wisdom of Crowds."
http://news.com.com/Myths+run+wild+in+blog+tsunami+debate/2100-1028_3-5510322.html
-snip-
mtm1963
Published: January 3, 2005, 6:53 AM PST
By John Schwartz
The New York Times
As the horror of the South Asian tsunami spread and people gathered online to discuss the disaster on sites known as Web logs, or blogs, those of a political bent naturally turned the discussion to their favorite topics.
To some in the blogosphere, it simply had to be the government's fault.
On Democratic Underground, a blog for open discussion and an online gathering place for people who hate the Bush administration, a participant asked, "Since we know that the atmosphere has become contaminated by all the atomic testing, space stuff, electronic stuff, earth pollutants, etc., is it logical to wonder if: Perhaps the 'bones' of our earth where this earthquake spawned have also been affected?"
The cause of the earthquake and resulting killer wave, the writer said, could be the war in Iraq. "You know, we've exploded many millions of tons of ordnance upon this poor planet," the writer said. "All that 'shock and awe' stuff we've just dumped onto the Asian part of this earth--could we have fractured something? Perhaps the earth was just reacting to something that man has done to injure it. The earth is organic, you know. It can be hurt."
The ridicule began immediately. Online insults, referred to colloquially as flames, rose high on other sites.
"What would life be without D.U.?" asked an editor at Wizbang, a politically conservative blog, using the initials of Democratic Underground.
"Get out the tin foil hats," a contributor to the blog wrote.
The interplay between the sites, left and right, is typical of the rumbles in cyberspace between rivals at different ends of the political spectrum. In many ways, Web logs shone after the tsunami struck: bloggers in the regions posted compelling descriptions of the devastation, sometimes by text messages sent from their cellphones as they roamed the countryside looking for friends and family members. And blogs were quick to create links to charities so that people could help online.
But the blogosphere's tendency toward crackpot theorizing and political smackdown could not be suppressed for long.
"It's so much of what they feed on, so much of what they are," said James Surowiecki, the author of "The Wisdom of Crowds."
http://news.com.com/Myths+run+wild+in+blog+tsunami+debate/2100-1028_3-5510322.html
-snip-
mtm1963