Inkwell: Authors and Artists

    
I spit my coffee seeing you type that, Paul.
  

    
Well. My hair's long enough but I don't think I ever fit the image too
well. 
  

    

   Don't you have to have exerienced Free Love and/or lived in a commune
to really qualify as a hippy?
  

    
Heh...

> the sense that the WELL is a bunch of Sausalito ex-hippies
> is pretty much what you get from the book... can't argue with that.

Actually, I lied: I did argue with that, pointing out that Tom Mandel was
about as far from 'hippie' as you can get...
  

    
And we are not even going to mention Mark Ethan Smith.
  

    
Contrast, counterpoint or some kind of diversity is the engine.
  

    
Katie,

I wanted to say thanks for your hard work in producing an excellent
book -- or books, since I enjoyed your last one just as much. 

I finished 'The Well' during a business trip last weekend, re-joined
upon my return and have spent many hours immersing myself here since.
I'd signed up several years back, but hadn't been able to keep up the
investment of time or money back then. You reminded me why I'd come
here in the first place.

And, as somebody who now has a hand in nurturing a small online
community, I'm appreciative to both Cliff and yourself for putting some
of the WELL's history down on paper.

Looking forward to your next book ...
  

    
Um, this may have been asked before, so forgive me if that's so, but
do you have a signing tour or such in the works to support the book?
  

    

#105 of 308: Katie Hafner (kmh)      Wed Jun  6 '01 (11:15)    10 lines


 That's sure nice to hear (about people buying the book, and their
 reasons for it). All the book needs is a little viral push (there's no
 rpt. no publicity budget, or book tour budget, but that's just me
 whining).
  

    
You've got to wonder what the publishing industry is thinking. It pays
out advances on these things, pays editors to edit them, pays printers
to print them and binders to bind them, pays truckers to drive them to
the warehouse...and then they don't let people know they're there? 

I've said it before, I'll say it again: the publishing industry makes
the record industry look like it's run by geniuses. 
  

    

After inexplicably missing the one which was a few blocks from my work, I'm 
going to the reading up north in Marin tonight. In response <11> above it's
listed as July 11, 7:30 p.m. at Book Passage (51 Tamal Vista Blvd) in Corte
Madera.  (And Katie, I want to invite you (again) to the WELL picnic, 
coming up Sunday the 15th.  It's more than proof of a living 
WELL, it's demonstrably fun, and as always there are details in the 
<party.> conference.  Plus other planning and announcments for various 
other parties or picnics in other places.)  
  

    

there was a reading in Emeryville tonight,  but I missed it due to
intolerable traffic from SF.  Anyone go?
  

    

  I finally got to meet Katie in person, she came and spoke to us here
at Microsoft Research.  She's an incredibly charming and engaging speaker,
bright and quick (and cute, too!) and obviously cares a great deal about
her work in general and this book in particular.  I gotta say, though, that
I just _loved_ the look on her face when I asked her to sign my copy and
she asked "To who?".  The shock followed by a very sincere smile and laugh
and a handshake was truly special; thanks Katie!

  I told her, and she asked me to repeat it here, that she'd basically
convinced me about the value of her book as a WELL history.  I protested
"but Katie, nobody will listen to me!" but she thought some folks would.

  I just reviewed my previous comments in this topic, and there's nothing
much that I'd change -- and they don't contradict what I just said.
  

    <scribbled by rab Fri 3 Aug 01 17:53>
  

    

>I told her, and she asked me to repeat it here, that she'd basically con-
>vinced me about the value of her book as a WELL history.

That's cool, Bob.
  

    

A critique of the book and The WELL from one mentioned in it:

 http://www.angelfire.com/bc3/dissident/
  

    
Good for you, Gail.  I'm glad you posted that!
  

    
Sure thing.  And if anyone who is a WELL member is reading topics here in
inkwell.vue and can't figure out how to get in here to post, check out the
side panel (the left frame) in the not-logged-in version of this material.
There is a help link, and there is also help on the page about registering
which explains how to log in.
  

    

  That "critique" is filled with lies and innuendo.  I say this as one who
was here, actively participating, from June 1985 -- which was, I think,
before MES got an account.

  Here's what I recently posted in another WELL conference:

        Oh, now MES claims to have named the Hog Farm.  Gawd, this gets
     richer every time it's told.  I couldn't read the whole rambling
     screed, the lies and distortions were far too thick.  Just for the most
     obvious point, MES' words were never censored to my knowledge, but they
     (and most everything else from the very early days of the WELL) were
     lost over time to various disk-space-driven purges of old conference
     topics.  Yes, believe it or not, once upon a time the entire WELL had
     to live within a single pair of 300-megabyte Eagle disk drives and if
     we got close to filling them a hue and cry went up to delete old
     inactive topics.  Disk space was not always cheap and plentiful.

        And the quote from Donna Hall (sof) has it's own errors; I don't
     have any reason to think that Donna was lying but she clearly has
     her facts mixed up -- and that makes her opinions suspect.

        MES' claim that she never attacked anyone is a bald-faced lie, and
      the only reason she thinks she can get away with it is that there is
      no longer any record of her vitriol online.  However, lots of us have
      ample clear memories....

        I couldn't finish the screed, but dipped in here and there looking
      for gems of lies -- and found one every place I stopped.  Amazing.
  

    
He's right in that his request for pronouns go unheard...
  

    
Well, it looks like some mutual wounds have not been healed by time.

I hope this opportunity to exchange different perspectives on history
doesn't turn out to be a preamble to the most boring sort of mutual 
flaming.
  

    

   MES' so-called "requests for pronouns" are just attempts to be
controlling and somewhat passive-aggressive, and are rationalized so
poorly that it continually amazes me that anyone coherent enough to
actually type complete sentences can claim with a straight face to be
taken in by them.
  

    

Maybe it's the fact that I don't have history with him, but the story on
his Web site seemed quite credible to me, at least the parts that I also
had some experience with, particulary his treatment at the hands of Tom
Mandel, who also treated me very, very badly during my only
communication with him, which was the News 1290 issue.

There's probably some mental illness involved - he says depression - and
it sounds like some other issues that probably stem from the childhood
abuse he suffered which colored his other experiences.

But, I too suffer from depression, and I also was subjected to years of
abuse as a child, so I feel somewhat sympathetic.  That, combined with
having some experience at employment situations that are comparable in a
very small way to his, and my observation of the way that some people on
the WELL are treated, lend credence to what he says, particularly when I
see that people still don't honor his request for the use of the male
pronoun.

So I feel quite sympathetic, at least right now, and without more exposure
to him.

And I learned very early on not to make myself vulnerable to attack on the
WELL by posting issues that I'm sensitive about, which he did not, so
perhaps he also has some boundary issues.
  

    

  Linda, MES was extremely aggressive and abusive, which is precisely
why I've chosen to never ever again honor that irrational phobia about
pronouns.  My own personal experiences with abuse and depression also
made me much *less* sympathetic to her, FWIW.
  

    

Thanks for that point of view, rab.

I sent him e-mail correcting something that he said about inkwell that was
patently untrue and chatting a bit, and he wrote back quite cheerfully,
thanking me for the clarification.  He says he has removed the passage in
question from the Web site.