"Act of speech"


Cherish no hope.
We are all barbarians.
Ban Plato's Republic.
It is the cruellest of all.
Keep an eye open
on whatever sounds too optimistic.
We are living a millenarian enpasse.
No way out, unless
one becomes trans.

So, cherish no hope, you idealists,
You, programmatic reformists.
An islands is an island.
No peace,
no holiness.
But a perennial tempest.

And men? Who are these shaved creatures
As smooth as worms, wearing their pride
as scented oils.

Men's actions are motivated by pure interest.
Men inhabit their souls like tight uniforms.


The soul is an island.
Its act of speech is the
Soliloquy, it believes in day-dreams,
- The physical love

Of humans
Having the right as humans
To claim their rights.

(Il Diritto Romano)
Enlightened law, insufficient
To subside the
Fire
(L'incendio di Troia).
It fosters knives and free
Brutality.

Keep an eye open on whatever sounds
Natural.
Fail
All hypothesis.

Some years ago, I saw a boy
(- now a fair Lady)
Sporting his errors about as a blue parasol,
Enraptured at every sunset
And yet despising the light.

He seemed to love bingos.


America is now dependent on Africa for 40 per cent
Of its oil imports.

The come to my house,
Looking for weapons.
(Men's souls cannot be
disciplined.)

A fair desire, to claim official burial
in the style of the community,
A dog weeping by your coffin, an old neighbour wearing a black tie,
your son incapable of feeling sad,
The day bright. No sound, but a slow whispering,

A music of tears, all your friends there, the transvestites,
Transparent in their transverse direction,
Transposing their bodies from a place to another,
Transporting them to a distant country,
To Australia, for instance.

He saw it all, the transmuting of a soul from a being into another,
The transformation of a happy dog into a dog weeping at his funeral,
A transcendental creature white and young into one tired and old,
Who was re-writing a novel,
The transgressive passage of a transcript,
transfiguring
Features, plots, pouring the troubles of his own country into a refrain.

Some years ago, a man was nightly standing by a lamp- post
with his mouth wide-open,
Swallowing down
The entire environment.

There he stood, pre-literate, in a natural world,
poet of all poets, firm and pre-suicidal
in his monotonous stubborn soliloquy.
 (before reacting: check what he meant ).


26 January 2001


----- Original Message -----
From: david.bircumshaw <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, January 25, 2001 9:35 PM
Subject: Re: filter coffee anyone?


> Control, control, control, always control.
>
> One of the most chilling things I ever heard was a guy on the radio
> preaching the desirability of 'The Managed Society'. One of the desirable
> linements of poetry to me, as a kid, was that it was an art-form that
seemed
> to inhabit an area that was outside the status and economics bound run of
> the world, the mill. But of course I was naive then, however, I
fortunately
> remained so, and continue in the foolish notion of poetry as a kind of
free
> space of both heart and mind. But, again, that space seems to be
shrinking.
> In Britain we have hundreds of poets, poets of reputation, poets for every
> day of the year. Yet so many of them seem to speak in the same voice. A
> rather toneless accent, although vaguely middle-class. Vaguely male too,
> even among the women. (Yes, I know there are exceptions, please don't tell
> me).
> The reason for this seems to be an ambience of group conformity in which
> they practise, one in which fear of making a mistake is the dominant
force.
> Like a rather boring cheese-and-wine party. At which one must not fart,
> swear, shout or enthuse. And the culture of criticism and review that
> surrounds, supports, develops them, is even more imaginatively stunted and
> intellectually enervate.
> And everybody is watching everybody else.
> Lists like this, and a certain Other List which may be known to some, are
> among the very few public, open places of debate I know of in our culture.
> To deliver them to moderation, to potential imaginary league-tables of
> success, to made hierarchies of acceptability, is a sure way to that old
> familiar shadow, the mainstay of the quotidian, and paradise regained of
the
> mediocre, Null and Void.
>
> david bircumshaw
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: komninos zervos <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Thursday, January 25, 2001 8:32 PM
> Subject: filter coffee anyone?
>
>
> > what do people think about a mediated discussion list that is organised
> > this way?
> > ie the lurkers have a chance to vote for posts, the posters would then
> know
> > how much the list agrees or disagrees with what they say, rather than
just
> > one or two pro-posters and anti-posters?
> > komninos
> >
> >
> >
> > Web Sites Begin to Self Organize
> > By KATIE HAFNER
> >
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> --
> > ----
> >
> > SUZANNE CROSS, a 49-year-old paralegal in New Orleans with a passion for
> > history, is a prolific writer for a Web site called The VinesNetwork,
> which
> > bills itself as "the Encyclopedia of Everything, Built by Everyone."
> > Articles on the site, covering dozens of different topics, are all
written
> > by members.
> >
> > Since Ms. Cross began writing for The Vines last August, she has
produced
> > nearly 40,000 words about ancient Rome. Her nom de plume is Heraklia
> Aelius
> > and her lengthiest work to date, 18,000 words, is a series on the life
of
> > Julius Caesar.
> >
> > Ms. Cross knows her writing is valued highly by other members of The
Vines
> > (www.thevines.com). In fact, she knows exactly how highly she is prized,
> > because they give her grades. They rate each of her articles on a scale
of
> 1
> > to 10. Ms. Cross consistently scores above 9.5, which puts her articles
at
> > the top of their category. As a result, she is featured more prominently
> on
> > the site than lower-scoring writers.
> >
> > The Vines and similar sites for writers operate not as conventional
> > publications might, with dozens of editors deciding what to publish.
> > Everything that is submitted is published, and then the members' tastes
> > determine what articles you can actually find without burrowing into the
> > site in search of that 0.5 article on someone's theory about other
> > universes.
> >
> > "It's really hard to find the really bad stuff on The Vines, said Eden
> Muir,
> > a founder of the site. "It's designed to make the bad stuff disappear.
It
> > will be up for a little while, then it will sink like a stone."
> >
> > On the other hand, articles with the highest ratings bubble to the top,
> and
> > aspiring writers like Ms. Cross, whose articles have also attracted
notice
> > from the outside world, are enjoying a level of recognition that might
not
> > have been possible without the Web.
> >
> > The Vines is an example of an emerging class of what are called
> > self-organizing Web sites. Such sites are demonstrating that with a dab
or
> > two of well-written code and a bit of careful planning, a site can take
a
> > random collection of links or posts and turn them into a sophisticated,
> > adaptive system.
> >
> > Articles submitted to The Vines are read and rated by members. Software
> > handles the rest, putting the highest-rated articles at the top of their
> > respective categories. Royalties are based on the popularity of the
> article.
> > The Vines also holds periodic contests and awards cash prizes to the
> writers
> > with the highest standing, using the automated ranking system.
> >
> > "The Web in 1996 didn't need to organize itself," said Joey Anuff, who
is
> > editor in chief of a new self-organizing site called Plastic.com. "But
we
> > have a Web now that's measured in billions of pages and millions of
users,
> > so any kind of mechanism that automatically imposes order becomes more
> > useful and important."
> >
> > Most efforts at self-organization so far have been fairly simple, but
> > effective. Several features on Amazon.com, like the list of authors with
> > books similar to the one being viewed, take what could be a random
> database
> > and develop relationships within it. The search site Google, which ranks
a
> > site depending on how many other sites have linked to it, is yet another
> > example of self- organization at work.
> >
> > Sites for writers, like The Vines and others, are growing quickly,
largely
> > because of people's pent-up urge to pepper the world with their prose.
> >
> > The writers certainly aren't driven by money. Contributors to The Vines
> and
> > other self-publishing sites are paid a nominal fee. Ms. Cross has been
> paid
> > $50 so far for roughly 40,000 words. "Maybe someday it will amount to
> > something," she said, "but I'm not planning retirement. I'm not even
> > planning a dinner."
> >
> > More gratifying than the small payments is recognition from the outside
> > world. On the strength of her articles on The Vines, Ms. Cross was
> recently
> > asked to contribute a chapter to a book on ancient Rome, to be published
> in
> > the spring by ibooks, a new imprint of Simon & Schuster.
> >
> > Carol Skolnick, a 43-year-old copy writer in Manhattan who focuses on
> > spiritual topics, writes for ThemeStream (www .themestream.com), another
> > writers' site. Ms. Skolnick has been asked to contribute four of her
> > ThemeStream essays to the "Chocolate for Women" series of inspirational
> > books, published by Simon & Schuster.
> >
> > Another ThemeStream author, A. M. Benneter of Seattle, who writes film
> > reviews, noticed recently that her review of the Sylvester Stallone film
> > "Get Carter" had been quoted in national advertising campaigns.
> >
> > Yet another ThemeStream writer, Laura Shanley, of Boulder, Colo., who
> > specializes in health and nutrition-related topics, recently attracted
the
> > attention of television producers at work on a medical series. The
> producers
> > sent a film crew to interview Ms. Shanley. They were especially
interested
> > in two of her articles, "Cleanup on Aisle Nine: Woman Gives Birth in
> Grocery
> > Store" and "Milkmen: Fathers Who Breastfeed."
> >
> > There is also plenty of potential for abuse on the writers' sites.
Recruit
> a
> > group of friends to award your writing four stars every 20 minutes or so
> for
> > a few days, and your work is bound to drift to the top of the heap.
> >
> > But Themestream and other sites have developed methods for identifying
> > so-called click circles, which consist of people who work to inflate one
> > another's ratings. "We look for people who exhibit certain
> characteristics,"
> > said Bill Turpin, a founder of ThemeStream. "We measure the time between
> > when you load the page and when you rate it, and if you rate everything
> > good, with no variability in your ratings."
> >
> > The reverse can happen, too. Richard Bossi, a 42-year-old freelance
writer
> > and former chef in Folsom, Calif., contributes food-related articles to
> The
> > Vines under the name ChefCayenne. His ratings are consistently high, but
> > once in a while he will see one of his articles come under attack by
what
> > some Web writers call retalirators. "People will sink me to the bottom,"
> Mr.
> > Bossi said. "There's a lot of jealousy."
> >
> > Another form of adaptive Web site assigns ratings not to submissions
> > themselves but to members' comments about the submissions. Slashdot, a
> > three-year-old site for computer buffs that uses such a system, is the
> model
> > for the new site Plastic.com. Slashdot operates with a minimum of human
> > intervention yet gives visitors the opposite impression.
> >
> > Articles sent to Slashdot (slashdot.org) are culled from the Web. After
> > passing an initial test of suitability, administered by a Slashdot
editor,
> a
> > contribution is posted, followed by dozens, sometimes hundreds, of
> comments
> > from the site's 305,000 users.
> >
> > Once you have established yourself as a seasoned Slashdot user, the
system
> > will periodically assign you "moderator" status, a temporary position
that
> > carries with it the right to rate other members' comments on a scale of
0
> to
> > 5. Users can then browse through Slashdot using a quality filter. With
the
> > filter set to 3, for example, a visitor will see only those comments
with
> a
> > rating of 3 or higher.
> >
> > Slashdot members who receive high ratings also earn special privileges:
> > their posts start out at a higher rating than usual, and they are more
> > likely to be chosen as a moderator in the future.
> >
> > "This last privilege is a brilliant example of metafeedback at work,"
said
> > Steven Johnson, the author of the forthcoming book "Emergence: The
> Connected
> > Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities, and Software" (Scribner, 2001) and a vice
> > president of Automatic Media, Plastic.com's parent company.
> >
> > "It's the ratings snake devouring its own tail," Mr. Johnson said.
> > "Moderators rate posts, and those ratings are used to select future
> > moderators." The most impressive aspect of the Slashdot system, Mr.
> Johnson
> > said, is that it not only encourages high quality in submissions to the
> > site, but it also sets up an environment where community leaders can
> > naturally rise to the top.
> >
> > "It's interesting and powerful and it really works," Mr. Johnson said,
> > adding that only the Internet could give rise to such a system. "It
allows
> > large groups of minds to get together and interact in a way they could
> never
> > do before, in any other medium."
> >
> > Another self-organizing aspect of Slashdot is the fact that because
nearly
> > all of the site's content comes from its readers, its emphasis changes
> > according to contributors' interests. "The subject matter we cover has
> > changed over the last couple of years because what our readers are
> > interested in has changed," said Jeff Bates, a Slashdot founder.
> >
> > Now, for instance, Mr. Bates said, the site carries far more articles
> about
> > civil liberties than it did two years ago. "It's not a decision we made
by
> > sitting down in a smoky room and saying, `All right, we're going to be
all
> > about civil liberties now,' " Mr. Bates said. "But we all agreed, in
some
> > kind of Jungian collective unconscious way, that that topic was a big
> deal."
> >
> > Plastic.com, which made its official debut earlier this week, is very
> > similar to Slashdot, but with a more general audience in mind. While
> > Slashdot advertises itself as "News for Nerds," Plastic.com will cover
> > politics, movies, technology, games, music and other topics.
> >
> > "We're trying to develop a system that can take the whole concept of
news
> > and figure out a way where the people who use the system can themselves
> > decide what's interesting or not," said Mr. Anuff, who is also
co-founder
> of
> > Suck.com, a popular online magazine. "The end result will be a
> > community-defined front page."
> >
> > A still purer example of a self-organizing site is Everything2.com,
> created
> > a year ago by Nathan Oostendorp, 22, a Slashdot founder. Unlike Slashdot
> and
> > Plastic.com, which draw heavily on news stories found on the Web,
> > Everything2 (everything2.com) more closely resembles writers' sites like
> The
> > Vines, because it links only to other links within the site.
> >
> > Yet Everything2 works far more autonomously than sites like The Vines.
The
> > Everything2 software monitors traffic patterns and modifies itself
> > accordingly, assigning higher status to the more popular links. Users
can
> > also collect "experience points" and vote on one another's posts.
> >
> > "It's this soup where people can drop in any little bit of information
> they
> > want, like their favorite movies or directors or any other ideas," Mr.
> Anuff
> > said, "and the only things they can link it to is other people's ideas
in
> > the same soup."
> >
> > At first glance, Everything2 appears to be a chaotic jumble of random
> > discourse. Look a little more closely, however, and you will see an
> > intricately interconnected conversation, touching on topics as diverse
as
> > the languages of India, MTV and melanoma treatments.
> >
> > "It's not really about anything in particular," said Mr. Oostendorp,
whose
> > site has about 2,000 users a day. "The only thing that's there is the
> > system. Here's an open database with these rules functioning, and if you
> > come in and spend time on it, you can gain prestige and reputation
within
> > the system, and that's an attractor to a lot of people."
> >
> > Web sites with mechanisms for self-filtering, self-ranking and
> > self-organization are very likely to continue to grow in number. "This
is
> a
> > fundamental shift in the Web's evolution," said Mr. Johnson, at
Automatic
> > Media. "The first generation of the Web was individual interactivity.
And
> > now, after a period of distraction, it's getting back to the roots of
the
> > idea of interactivity." But this time, he added, the interactivity is
> > collective.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > komninos's cyberpoetry site http://student.uq.edu.au/~s271502
> > cyberpoet@slv site http://www.experimedia.vic.gov.au/cyberpoet/
> > komninos zervos, tel. +61 7 5552 8872
> > lecturer in cyberStudies,
> > school of arts,
> > gold coast campus,
> > griffith university,
> > pmb 50, gold coast mail centre
> > queensland, 9726
> > australia.
>