An Outsiders look at Commenting, Community and the Deadspin Situation Part 1
Hi everybody. I originally had an idea for a post on my take on the Deadspin situation. It soon evolved into something much more. I broke it up and serialized it, because I’m not Simmons and I can’t just plug in 80′s references to keep the masses entertained over a long piece. Stay tuned all week for updates to the story.
An Outsider’s look at Commenting, Community and the Deadspin Situation: Part 1
Hello Deadspinites, Blogrifca, and fellow Commentariat,
Some of you know me, or have gotten to know me pretty recently. If we don’t know each other, perhaps we soon shall. I call the Wintry city of Edmonton, Canada home, and am a quasi-intellectual sports fanatic. I’m also an outsider from the comenting/website/blogger community, just now finding my way in.
Several years ago the Internet was a vast oasis of porn and mostly obscure reference/research information. Sure NHL.com and ESPN.com existed, but they were to the current internet what Chris Wallace and his like are to competent sports management. They were slow, inefficient and got no respect (not that they deserved any). If you wanted to have a discussion with someone you’d call them up from a landline telephone or perhaps even write them a letter.
So obviously the Internet community was archaic and limited to a few factions. The Pedobears, being the forward thinking insightful group that they are, were there with bells on. It seems that Mystery Vans with the promises of free candy weren’t quite working like they once did. The response was to move on to nearly instant (fucking dialup) distant relationships with the possibility of something more. A subset of this group was the stupid teenagers in chatrooms with the incessant A/S/L, what are you wearing type questions (I call this a subset, because many of the so called teenagers were in fact sneaky Pedobears trying to score underage ass). (more…)
