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Quiet, Everybody is talking

I have to admit, I'm kind of scared of the internet now.  It's been so long since I've actually tried to engage with it. You know like when you're trying to jump rope and you're watching the rope to see when you should jump in? Yeah, kind of that, except there are like five million ropes going in all directions at once... Somewhere in this merry journey of capitalism, we seem to have shifted our focus from actually acquiring capital, or labor, to simply acquiring attention. I guess it was when Elon Musk bought Twitter for way more than it was worth - in terms of actual capital value, at least.  We've always had models in the world that sell attention. The Byron Echo gets delivered to my house once a week, as it does to every resident in the shire, and I don't have to pay for it. The team at the Echo know that they are going to lose money on every paper. What they are is  an attention merchant.  They have people reading their free newspaper, so they can sell ...
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The Information Addict

I walked behind her, the city swirling in the human ejecta that had arrived predictably from the office buildings as the workday drew to a close. She brushed awkwardly against the tide of pedestrian traffic, distracted,  her honey brown hair swinging. The leather satchel hung heavily from her shoulder, making the task at hand that much more difficult. Her secondary goals were to catch the train, to cross the busy streets, but her primary focus right now, in the bustle of the busiest city street was her smartphone. She held it out like a compass, engaged in a pressing conversation. I saw the blurs of blue and green as she dodged the passers by - the telling hues of the Android SMS app.  I stared at her golden hoop earring, mesmerized, as it swayed all of its own accord with the rhythm of the street.  It seemed almost comical, to watch somebody furiously engaged in texting, in this peculiar form of social interaction, in the middle of a million people.  I began to w...

Brush Strokes

What she meant was never clear. As she stumbled, in suspended animation, her long hair falling despondently ahead of her into the chasm that opened before her, the garbled sentiment seemed heartfelt and intensely personal. Hoping she'd be the one to plant herself on in. The draining, collapsing of a worldview and creative consciousness as she dropped, inch by tentative inch, a perfectly transcendental descent. After the fall, the world completely transfixed itself around change. Every day, the change was present, like a stalker, constant, enforcing it's nebulousness - it's constant, incessant presence. Always. Nothing was the same. She was never the person she could have been. The kind of person that she was always poised to become. Those memories lingered, not with the breadth of potential that they held in precognizant times, but with the bitter residual momentum of difference. His dreams held her aloft, strained to push against her 'real' self, not the calcul...

Blessed are the ListMakers

This is a post from my morning pages completed at http://750words.com . These early posts are frequently disconnected, semi-cohesive train-of-thought ramblings, and they very seldom see the light of day. I recently re-read this entry from September last year and it resonated a bit with me - perhaps because it is a product of my sleep-fogged brain. If you're interested in writing, sign up and get started writing your own 750 words a day. It's kind of fun!  What is it with the ability to know anything at all, with the ideas that we float along in our heads, the half structured, the impending and the unknown tangible fleeting moments that scuttle around in our minds as we weave our ways through the day. Carrying in our minds this impending activity - one that, while started can never really be finished - that there's no urgency, only a vague kind of responsibility, a light and unfettered dusting of supposed-to, once that has gone, and it is so easily resplendent in the gala...

Royalty

I awake in the quiet of the morning, reclining on my bed, made by the finest mattress-makers in all the land, filled with natural fibres and customised support structures, designed to ensure that I awake from each night's sleep revitalised and refreshed. I rise into the sunshine amid the sounds of the parrots frolicking in the garden, and don fine robes, crafted far off in the orient. I dress for comfort and warmth, and that which I seek I find instantly in my wardrobe, filled with many, many such clothes for all occasions. As I descend the staircase, I feel that perhaps I should like a warm, invigorating beverage to ease the chill on this winter morning. "As you wish, my Liege" - A beautiful white clean china cup, with intricate floral designs, and an ingenious machine that heats water almost instantly sparks into life with a gentle boiling hush. While I wait the idle minute or so, I gaze out at the tropical landscape, quietly encompassing the view, a dense majesty so ri...

The Man who lived in the Sea

At the edge of the world, where the sand meets up against the crystal cylinders of the rolling blue windswept ocean lived a simple and humble man, who had forsaken the land and his family. He stayed, for the most part, drifting around in the water, floating with the waves, riding the swollen anticipation that stemmed from the storms far out to sea on a hand made board. Fed up with the complications of the land, of the stupid human machinations of society, of people, and responsibility, he had awoken one morning with the seed of an idea. And over time, although that seed was poised to blossom into a crazy proposition, he nurtured it, referred to it in quiet moments standing at the bus stop. He held it close to him, and it was never far from his thoughts. This is how to grow oneself an idea - one holds it in the top of mind, and when pressured or sad, one recalls it. Soon, the idea will start to bud. Far from being fully-formed, an idea in the process of unfolding doesn't need to be ...

Introducing Musichord

I've always fancied myself as a writer for Rolling Stone. Living a wild reckless, rock n' roll lifestyle, touring around with no fixed address, being all edgy and drug addled and fuck-you establishment... Being one of those guys who can't speak, interviewing people who can't talk for the benefit of those who can't read... ...Overall, It seems I have (fortunately) chosen a somewhat different path, but part of that reckless dream lives on in my new blog, Musichord . Along with an old friend, Charles , I'll be posting my thoughts on new music I like. Yeah, as a couple of aging hipsters, it's tempting to hate everything that the kids come out with these days. But it turns out there's a lot to like out there. And if you're looking for something new to listen to, or just for that voyeuristic pleasure that comes from skipping through somebody else's iPod, you can head over to our new website - You can also get us on Facebook , and Twitter , too. Rock ...