Re: Declan as a Budding Washington Insider

[Tim May <tcmay@got.net>]

At 11:30 PM -0700 6/16/97, Bill Stewart wrote:

>Foo ...  On a list with several millionares, people who make the
>New York Times Magazine cover, people who get in the Times for
>successfully suing the NSA, college students who get covered on
>National Public Radio, people who were in Wired before it was c001,
>people who drop in on Esther in New York because they'll be too
>busy to see her at Hackers', people who were Xanadudes or SGML hackers
>decades before the Web caught on, people who were on the Well
>before that Grateful Dead lyricist got there, various wizards of
>speed and time, folks who have Japanese tv crews show up for their parties
>and already know Tim Leary when he drops... by, I'd say we have enough
>people who are or know Silicon Valley insiders to really complain much
>when people from the Other Coast talk about who _they_ had lunch with :-)

I asked Marc what he thought of this, and he suggested we wander over and
ask Ted. Ted said it had to do with everything being deeply intertwingled.
The other Ted, the microprocessor guy, just wanted to get back to
woodworking.

Later on I ran into Whit and he said he hadn't given it much thought, but
that maybe Larry had.

I resolved to ask Gordon how he dealt with this situation, but I may not
run into him for awhile.

Next Saturday I'll ask Woz, assuming he show's up at Alan's party as he
usually does.

What was your point again?

(On a serious note, I take Bill's point. But I am not criticizing Declan's
growing list of contacts, I am really commenting on the "gossipy" aspect of
all D.C. politics. "There's no there, there," to paraphrase the Other
Dorothy (and not the Oz one). In D.C., the whole political process is a
series of social contacts. This is markedly different from life here in the
Greater Bay Area (100 miles north-south, 20 miles east-west), where the
technology and products dominate over gossip. Or so I think. Reporters in
the Bay Area are much less dependent on spin doctors for their stories.)

--Tim May



There's something wrong when I'm a felon under an increasing number of laws.
Only one response to the key grabbers is warranted: "Death to Tyrants!"
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Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
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