Joho the Blog
An Entry from the Archives

How dare you imply, by quoting with no apparent disapproval, that Dave Winer was not the first blogger? Yet another example of rewriting the early history of human intellectual achievement while completely eliminating mention of his work.

Oh, God...

Can we elevate ourselves any more? We Prometheans bringing the light to the benighted masses... "White man's burden," in the digital age. Perhaps we can hand out colorful guides printed on glossy paper to go along with the 100 million laptops we're going to hand out, so folks who don't have clean water to drink or adequate health care, or a heads up that a wall of water may be headed their way, or even a goat can participate in the global "conversation" and be "taught" or "shown" the new "etiquette."

I didn't think Copenhagen was at such a high altitude. In fact, I'm pretty sure it's at sea level. So what accounts for the hypoxia?

Well, I'm glad it was "entertaining."

I just checked his slides, available at

">http://www.benhammersley.com/weblog/index.html

Wince, wince, wince ...

Anybody who has seen how some of the A-list bloggers behave (present company excepted) should fall down laughing at the connection with etiquette.

Thanks, Seth. I looked at the slides, and while I don't find them a model of clarity, I also didn't find the words about this "new world" being "destroyed" by people who presumably don't know any better. It'd be better to hear an audio recording or a transcription of the actual talk.

The deathless idea that "we can teach them" is very, very oversold.

Remember that in this case, the first thing "we" must "teach them" is to type.

Well, the web survived AOL, I'm sure it'll survive the huddled, unwashed masses, yearning to download free content.

No, no, Samuel Pepys!

Sorry, Dave Rogers... you had to be there. Made perfect sense at the time (it rocked, yes).

Oh My giddy aunt. "if only you were there .... then you would understand.." - Sadly I wasn't - I only found out about the existence of Reboot 48 hours before it started.

I've read some of the blogs and comments and yes I've seen the slides. My overriding sense is as follows:

1. You needed to have been there. The slides and comments explain nothing. It's like listening to my giddy teenage daughters having returned from an amazing disco/festival/gathering/thing who now want to save the world.

2. So - we are already being categorized as either 'A' list bloggers or totally out of it? - The old method of seperate and rule and lets keep it to ourselves.

Does anyone - anyone have any audios of what went on?
I would at least like to understand something more.

At present - I have no idea of what you are talking about and at least I am half literate. If you are worried about the unwashed masses, then don't. They really couldn't give a toss -

Change the world? Nice idea - digital prophets! The medium is NOT the message and I refuse to be reduced by such Mucluhanesce totalitarianism.

If we really care about people and community we need to see that all these things are "tools" and not ends in themselves.

The biggest danger digital prophets face is to be placed in perspective.

Blessings
Leonard Payne
Priest

Hugh and Leonard, an MP4 file of the talk is available here.

I've listened to Ben Hammersley's talk, and I'm in the process of writing a lengthier response in my weblog. I've also listened to Dave's and the Creativity panel discussion, and may comment at some point on those as well.

Not sure anyone is still following this discussion thread though.

What about ogg, 5300 BC?

- made cave drawings every evening depicting the day's hunt

I was going to
Learn Spanish in Costa Rica
but got sidetracked in Myrtle Beach. Now i speak fluent Redneck!

If you do a search on the Internet and try and find out when did the first blog appear.
You will find two things.
First some people will say that a blog is just a diary or a journal or something like that and they will give dates like 1709 or go back long before that date.
The other people will say that the blog began in 1992. What you will ask is so special about 1992. Well that is when the world wide web began. Yes there was Internet before 1992. But the web began in 1992.
At this time your not going to find anyone that is going to say, as I do, that the blog began in June of 1982. Well you will find one place on the web that will say that.. I will say it.

Now I am not fighting for the honor, if it is, of being the first blog. I just think that I maybe the first blog. I am not trying to copyright or trademark anything or make any money from the fact.
I am not even willing to fight over it.

Why do I think I was the first blog. Well in June of 1982 I setup Howard's Notebook, a bulletin board system, and people could dial into my BBS. At first they had to connect at 300 baud.
I posted the sort of stuff you see here now.. information and comments and what was going on in my life. I posted the comments that people sent to me about the BBS and subjects of interest. I had "links" to other information on the BBS. Things like list of ham clubs, ham repeaters, satellites in space and stuff like that.. plus I had a list of other bulletin board systems.
Later I added more phone lines to the BBS. A bit later I got connected to the Internet. Remember this was still before the WWW. So people could send and receive Internet email and read and post to newsgroups. I had some Internet email addresses setup as links so that a person just had to click on the link and it would enter the email address. (Because people could not understand how to address an email at that time.) Also I did things like add a phone line so that a person could click on another BBS from the list and my computer would dial out and connect and then the person was on my BBS but connected to a BBS someplace else.
So I think I had everything in place to be a blog and I think that Howard's Notebook was the first blog and it was June of 1982.

Now if you think that a blog is just a diary then.. no my blog was not the first. The first was not in 1709. The first diary may have been a drawing on the wall of cave someplace a long long time ago.
You want to thing that is the first blog then I have no problem with it. But no way did the first blog begin in 1992. Those that go for that date are just wrong. I was doing it before 1992. I was doing it 10 years before 1992.
I say the first blog was Howard's Notebook back in June of 1982. I say the first person to do a blog was Jim Howard. It was in the state of Missouri USA.
If I am wrong.. then just show me.