{"id":1542,"date":"2003-10-07T21:55:26","date_gmt":"2003-10-08T01:55:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/dbnews\/2003\/10\/07\/glenn-reynolds-realtime-instafeed-only"},"modified":"2003-10-07T21:55:26","modified_gmt":"2003-10-08T01:55:26","slug":"glenn-reynolds-realtime-instafeed-only-495hr","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dowbrigade\/2003\/10\/07\/glenn-reynolds-realtime-instafeed-only-495hr\/","title":{"rendered":"Glenn Reynolds Realtime Instafeed, Only $4.95\/hr"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n
\n

If a blog is a window into another person’s world, then what is the
\n ultimate blog? Many science fictions stories have speculated that eventually
\n we
\n will be able to port, record and broadcast (or narrowcast) the sensory
\n information arriving at any given brain so that others could experience
\n it voyeuristically.<\/p>\n

The technology to do this actually exists today, at least if we are
\n talking about a brain belonging to an individual like Glenn
\n Reynolds<\/a>,
\n who, judging
\n by the frequency, chronological sequentially, and depth of his postings
\n spends at least 15 hours a day working at his computer.  Logic suggests
\n that for Glenn, the pixels of his monitor are, to a high degree, the
\n sum and substance of his sensory input, at least for long stretches of
\n his
\n day.<\/p>\n

What if you could see an exact mirror of everything that flashes across
\n Glenn’s screen, AT THE SAME TIME HE SEES IT. You could actually watch
\n over his shoulder as he composes and posts his profundities! Read his
\n personal, private email! Watch as he googles and insinuates himself into
\n databases and rumor mines, ferreting out the good stuff like a coon dog
\n after a pregnant possum!  Talk about access to sources! How much
\n would you pay for THAT? How about $4.95 an hour?<\/p>\n

It would be like being behind Glenn Reynolds’ eyeballs! It would be
\n the ultimate in reality reporting, an insight into the creative process,
\n and an intolerable invasion of privacy.  Screen sharing technology
\n has been around for a while, and it would be no technical problem to
\n webcast the live Glenn Reynolds computer screen feed. Even sound, for
\n a complete sensory experience, is eminently possible.<\/p>\n

I chose Glenn as my example both because he seems to be constantly posting,
\n researching, poeticizing and pontificating online, and because his
\n work, both in conception and execution, is of such high quality that
\n I suspect I would enjoy reading his laundry list or watching him de-spam
\n his inbox.  I mean no disrespect, and am sure Glenn is a nice guy.<\/p>\n

In fact, we were introduced at BloggerCon by Dave
\n Wine<\/a>r.  Finding
\n myself struck uncharacteristically mute, I mumbled something and shook
\n his hand before wandering off. I was stone-cold intimidated, and I don’t
\n intimidate easy.  Later, in retrospect, it seemed that in Glenn’s
\n presence saying anything less than brilliant, incisive or profound would
\n be not only embarrassing but somehow sacrilegious.  This tends to
\n put a damper on conversation.<\/p>\n

I imagine this can be a problem for Glenn.  Later that night I
\n saw him at the reception in solitary conversation with Eugene
\n Volokh<\/a>.  All
\n around them knots and gaggles of bloggers argued, mocked, baited and
\n joked, but around the two supernovae in the Blogging constellation a
\n buffer zone of respect and fear had formed.  Not due to any conviction
\n that there were secrets being discussed, or that we were witnessing some
\n Blogging equivalent of San Martin meeting with Bolivar
\n in Guayaquil in 1822<\/a>.  I think it was sheer intimidation factor due to the stature
\n of the intellects involved. It’s lonely at the top.<\/p>\n

Of course, fame is relative, and context driven.  Glenn and Eugene
\n were probably chatting in the single room on the planet
\n where their particular brand of fame had the most weight and relevance
\n at that moment, given who else was there.  On
\n the other hand, among certain Amazonian tribes of my acquaintance Glenn
\n and Eugene would be more likely to wind up on the menu than on the guest
\n list.<\/p>\n

Be that as it may, we seem to have digressed rather far from the original
\n point.  Which was, if memory serves, how many of you would be willing
\n to pay $4.95 to watch everything that goes on and across Glenn Reynolds
\n screen
\n for
\n an hour? I know I’d pony up for a couple of hours, just to check it out. <\/p>\n

Would enough of us get sucked in to make it economically viable?  I
\n guess that depends on how badly Glenn needs money. Probably not badly
\n enough, at least not yet.  In addition, it will require a special personality,
\n some sort of cyber-exhibitionist, combined with sufficient celebrity
\n or notoriety,
\n to make it work.<\/p>\n

But I would wager that it will be sooner rather than later that we will
\n be able to experience this ultimate in reality blogging. The closest
\n thing to plugging into another person’s sensory input we are likely to
\n experience until we all have uni-plugs protruding from the bases of our
\n brainstems. Live feeds, 24-7, from internet luminaries around the globe.
\n Secrets of the superstars. Volume discounts available.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If a blog is a window into another person’s world, then what is the ultimate blog? Many science fictions stories have speculated that eventually we will be able to port, record and broadcast (or narrowcast) the sensory information arriving at … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":299,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1443],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1542","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-esl-links"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dowbrigade\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1542","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dowbrigade\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dowbrigade\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dowbrigade\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/299"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dowbrigade\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1542"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dowbrigade\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1542\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dowbrigade\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1542"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dowbrigade\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1542"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dowbrigade\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1542"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}