Bruce Sterling's Final Prediction

In Bruce Sterling's final column for Wired, he summarizes the output of a survey of Net prognosticators conducted by the Pew Internet & American Life Project. The piece is peppered with Sterling's trademarked stop-you-in-your-tracks imagery. An example: "The bubble-era vision of a Utopian Internet is dented and dirty... The Lexus has collided with the olive tree, and its crumpled hulk spins in a ditch as the orchard smolders."

Comments

Batshit Insane

[19thNervousBreakdown]

"The bubble-era vision of a Utopian Internet is dented and dirty... The Lexus has collided with the olive tree, and its crumpled hulk spins in a ditch as the orchard smolders."

This metaphor is a can of Pringles, and its vigor is enhanced by venomous ducks that flip it daily with a caterpillar that just won't shut up.

Seriously... what?

Re:Batshit Insane

[Bastian]

It was a book on globalization that came out several years back. The book-a-minute version I'd give for it is, "You can't stop globalization, but that's OK, because might makes right." The author tries to argue that the modern incarnation of free-market capitalism is a Good Thing, basically a remix of the old "rising tide that lifts all boats" combined with the pollyannaish implication that it must be good simply because it's happening.

There were a few good points in there, but all in all I think that deep down inside The Lexus and the Olive Tree there was a clear and concise essay screaming to get out and being smothered by 200 pages of ad-hoc musings that were thrown in as filler.

Re:Batshit Insane

[Dun Malg]

THe orchard-lexus metaphor is one of many literary constructs in its time-honored genre:

"Is there anything more beautiful than a beautiful, beautiful flamingo, flying across in front of a beautiful sunset? And he's carrying a beautiful rose in his beak, and also he's carrying a very beautiful painting with his feet. And also, you're drunk."
-- Jack Handey

"Love is like racing across the frozen tundra on a snowmobile which flips over, trapping you underneath. At night, the ice-weasels come."
-- Matt Groening

Unfortunately, I don't think Mr Sterling was trying to be funny.

Re:Batshit Insane

[morgan_greywolf]

Yet, it still doesn't. The book centers around the Lexus -- globalization -- and the olive tree -- tradition. I don't see how the Internet as it is today has anything to do with the collision of the Lexus and the olive tree. In my mind, the Internet is a $70,000 4.7L V8-powered 4WD Lexus LX SUV mowing down the entire olive tree orchard, while the trees scream in protest. Either that it's just a bunch of tubes, I haven't figured out which...

Re:Batshit Insane

[Bastian]

I should clarify. The book was, more or less, trying to argue that the whole globalization package - not gust the general idea of the world opening up, but all of the details of how it is happening right now - is optimal.

While pretty much everyone agrees that the general idea of globalization is good, there's still some room for debate over whether the particulars of how its happening are actually benefitting impoverished regions or if it's just forcing them into a "race to the bottom" (and possibly dragging developed and developing nations along for the ride, too). The situation with the garment industry in Cambodia is a current popular conversation topic along this line.

I guess a (stretched) analogy would be that while it's good to let some fresh air into your house, knocking out the windows with bricks isn't necessarily the best way to do it.

A Question In Parting

[Giant Ape Skeleton]

That column leaves me with one question for Bruce:

Who is your meth dealer, and does he make house calls?

IMHO

[El Cabri]

Wired is an overrated collection of BS. I read it for a while during the bubble extasia, found it was crap, stopped reading it. I picked up an issue (that one with the atheists) a few weeks ago to see if it had matured : in my opinion it has not. People who write for Wired should get out and do something useful.

Re:IMHO

[twifosp]

People who write for Wired should get out and do something useful.

What, like post on Slashdot criticizing other people's work, rather than creating something of your own?

"lexus and olive tree" Is a Tom Friedman reference

[Anonymous Coward]

Thomas Friedman used this visualization in a book I read about 4 years ago on Globalization. Wikipedia it.

English 2.0

[dintech]

The bubble-era vision of a Utopian Internet is dented and dirty... The Lexus has collided with the olive tree, and its crumpled hulk spins in a ditch as the orchard smolders.

I think he's using that new-fangled English 2.0 thingy.

Lexus and the Olive Tree

[CubeRootOf]

This refers to toms friedmans book ' Lexus vs the Olive Tree ' or close, look it up - its a good book.

Here is the summary:

The Lexus represents modern life, aka - globalization, the internet, computers etc etc, and our love for these things and conveinces which make our lives better.

The Olive Tree is our long standing traditions, communities, churches, families, the ties that bind us to each other and to the places we live.

I have not RTFA, but from the summary, I can see this guy is a good writer... although he does lean somewhat heavily on an informed audience.

This metaphor is actually pretty good - Our modern culture is clashing with our values, and its not pretty. Video game violence legislation, computure monotiring etc etc, all of the things we rail about on slashdot... the majority of them are a direct result of this clash.

Read the book, and understand your world better.

Don't read the book, trash authors because you don't get it, and look like an idiot.

Re:Lexus and the Olive Tree

[Wicked Zen]

While the original metaphor of the Lexus versus the olive tree might have been good, Sterling's reference to it is not. It is common in poor writers reference good work in an effort to make one's own seem better than it is.

"The Lexus has collided with the olive tree,"

Fine. He ought to have stopped right there.

"...and its crumpled hulk spins in a ditch as the orchard smolders."

Appalling. This Lexus has collided with an olive tree so violently that it has got the orchard (not just the tree) smoldering while the vehicle itself, now a crumpled hulk, is still spinning in a ditch. What got the smoldering staerted? Did the gas tank rupture and spew already-burning fuel all over it? It just doesn't make sense. Mr. Sterling has taken a perfectly apt metaphor and mangled it.

How one can draw the conclusion from this bit of tortured writing that the "guy is a good writer," I loath to guess. Taking that point of view, I would suppose that every movie that has a character utter "Here's looking at you kid," is a good one. It simply isn't the case.

Somewhere out there

[CaffeineAddict2001]

"The bubble-era vision of a Utopian Internet is dented and dirty... The Lexus has collided with the olive tree, and its crumpled hulk spins in a ditch as the orchard smolders..."

William Gibson and Chuck Palahniuk are saying to themselves: "Oh god, *I* don't sound like that, do I?"

translation

[bomb_number_20]

I got it! I got it! Here's my interpretation of his little... interpretation...

The internet is the olive tree. In the bubble, people thought the internet was going to solve everything- probably even cure cancer. Overall, techies saw it as a great equalizer, bringing 'peace' and 'equality' to the world. Still with me?

The Lexus is big business, big money and big investments, turning the internet into tv and basically ruining it while squabbling with one another over who gets to 'own' whatever part of things.

The Lexus colliding with the olive tree is the clash of ideals between how corporations think the internet should be run and, you know, the rest of us.

He sounds pretty pissed off and worn out to me. I can't say I blame him, though.

Of course, I didn't even read TFA.

Bad Metaphor

[superid]

A bad metaphor is like a leaky screwdriver.

(shamelessly stolen from someone's /. sig)

Wrong Bruce!

[CheeseTroll]

This just in: there are >1 persons named Bruce.

This is Bruce Sterling, the sci-fi author, not Bruce Perens, the OSS advocate.