Tuesday, December 07, 2004

Disbelievers in Their Own Revolution

THAT historic blogger Gary Baum of FoE Log fame is studying for a journalism degree, and current blog icon Maud Newton is pursuing a MFA, makes me wonder how much faith they have in a phenomenon they helped create. Half their minds are in the future; the other half stuck in the past.

Do they really want jobs in Old Media? Do they think that's where it's at?

Baum was farther along the path to success three years ago when his tales of the "Friends of Eggers" were the talk of New York. His retreat into obscurity is like Lawrence of Arabia signing up under an assumed name to be an ordinary serviceman in Britain ten years after his exploits.

As for Maud, if she's to achieve her ambitions as a writer (presumably with a story in The New Yorker-- and why not? hers can't be worse than the crap they publish) it will not be because she has a MFA degree-- forehead stamped in blue ink by the proper regulatory agency-- but because of the "networking" (massive apple-polishing) she does on her blog. That's how the game works, which she surely knows.

(Please note: This blog post was toned down in the interests of diplomacy.)

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