From: Walter Watts (wlwatts@cox.net)
Date: Wed Mar 20 2002 - 11:36:25 MST
Cult of the Cluetrain Manifesto
By John C. Dvorak
Now for my review of the book that won't die, The Cluetrain Manifesto.
This 1999 keeper is a book that tells us how the Internet changes
everything and tops that statement with every other cliché we've become
sick of over the past few years. The book is written by a cast of
characters who were apparently caught up in the dot-com scene at its
peak, and they managed to capture in one book almost all of the lunatic
fringe dingbat thinking that characterized the Internet boom. Through
the miracle of self-serving Web logs—or blogs—they have managed to keep
these now- retro thoughts alive and kicking in cult form.
The giveaway that cult thinking is present in any environment is how
responses are given from possible cult members to probable nonbelievers.
If you disagree, then you "don't get it." Werner Erhard of EST (the
über-cult of the 1970's) used to use this phrase over and over. Tell
Erhard that something makes no sense. "You don't get it." Tell him that
something is self-contradictory. "You don't get it." Tell him that
something is just plain stupid. "You don't get it." This is the level of
debate you can expect when cult thinking is present. But, of course, "I
don't get it."
A site to visit is www.cluetrain.com. There you can read a chapter from
the book where we learn bromides such as "life is too short" or read
cute mumbo jumbo such as "knowledge worth having comes from turned-on
volitional attention, not from slavishly following someone else's
orders." I rolled my eyes so much that my vision is now 20/20 from the
exercise. More interesting on the site is the massive list of
well-wishers, ding-dongs, and so-called signatories to the so-called
Manifesto itself. I'm sure many of them petition for the legalization of
marijuana too. Throw a dart at this list and you'll find one dot-com
failure after another.
Yet the apparent faith in this odd vision of an idealistic
human-oriented internetworked new world/new economy marches forward. I
imagine all these folks holding hands in a large circle, rolling back
and forth, with some in the middle of the circle, spinning and chanting
and hugging, all naked. I'm betting that most of these folks go to
Burning Man and all of them write blogs about it and how cool it was.
They link to each others' blogs and read what they say about each
other—all highly complimentary.
In fact the brown-nosing that goes on between bloggers singing each
others' praises makes the worst office kiss-ups look tame by comparison.
I mention this anomaly since these Cluetrain folks all believe the
opposite to be true. Somehow networking like this, according to the
Cluetrainees, reveals truth—when in fact it supports and forces the
worst kind of conformist behavior. Try to find a blog that is ever
critical of another blog. I've never seen it.
But I digress. Let's look at the cornball 95 Theses of the Cluetrain
Manifesto. Let's start at the beginning and go through the first ten in
order.
1. Markets are conversations. Exactly WHAT is this supposed to mean? Is
this supposed to be thought-provoking? Maybe if your IQ is 5. To me it
sounds like something someone would find written on a napkin after a
two-week LSD bender. The manifesto starts with this nonsense and get
worse.
2. Markets consist of human beings, not demographic sectors. Huh? Gosh,
whatever. Okay. Wow. But wait. I thought markets were conversations, not
people!
3. Conversations among human beings sound human. They are conducted in a
human voice. And the point of this comment is what? How about this for a
thesis: "People walk on two feet."
4. Whether delivering information, opinions, perspectives, dissenting
arguments, or humorous asides, the human voice is typically open,
natural, uncontrived. Again, what is the friggin' point of this
observation?
5. People recognize each other as such from the sound of this voice. Now
they're freaking me out. Can we move on?
6. The Internet is enabling conversations among human beings that were
simply not possible in the era of mass media. Oh? Like what? IM's?
Crummy e-mail? Spam? Note the cult word enabling. Look for empowering
coming soon.
7. Hyperlinks subvert hierarchy. Found on the other side of that napkin.
This means nothing. Hyperlinks are a navigational tool not a political
one. Get over yourselves.
8. In both internetworked markets and among intranetworked employees,
people are speaking to each other in a powerful new way. What? Klingon?
Are they using a megaphone? What powerful new way? Oh wait: blogs. That
must be it. I'm waiting for a blog written in Klingon. That would be
something.
9. These networked conversations are enabling powerful new forms of
social organization and knowledge exchange to emerge. Yeah, like what?
Communities? The Oxygen channel? Puh-leeze.
10. As a result, markets are getting smarter, more informed, more
organized. Participation in a networked market changes people
fundamentally. Oh really. People are changed fundamentally? Third eyes?
Extra toes? And note the clause As a result. As a result of what? And
since markets, according to the earlier thesis, are conversations, how
does that work?
They're right! I don't get it.
There are another 84 of these hippy-dippy assertions. My decision
revolves around whether to skewer the rest of this list next week, or
not. Hmmm, it depends on whether there is a market, I mean, a
conversation for it. Let the marketing begin. In other words, you tell
me.
-- Walter Watts Tulsa Network Solutions, Inc. "To err is human. To really screw things up requires a bare-naked command line and a wildcard operator."
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