the tweney review

“I just told my son that when I was a kid I had to leave home to play video games, to watch movies, to send mail, to see friends….”

–Martin Varsavsky on Twitter

“News is something someone wants to suppress. Everything else is advertising.” –Lord Northcliffe

By that measure, there are mighty few true news reporters in tech publishing right now. Declan McCullough, certainly; Kim Zetter’s coverage of e-voting machines also qualifies. Who else is uncovering news from the tech world that somebody wants to suppress?

(Quote taken from a biography I’m currently reading: All Governments Lie: The Life and Times of Rebel Journalist I. F. Stone, by Myra MacPherson. An alternate version of the quote: “News is what somebody somewhere wants to suppress; all the rest is advertising. “)

“When man invented the bicycle, he reached the peak of his attainments. Here was a machine of precision and balance for the convenience of man. And (unlike subsequent inventions for man’s convenience) the more he used it, the fitter his body became. Here, for once, was a product of man’s brain that was entirely beneficial to those who used it, and of no harm or irritation to others. Progress should have stopped when man invented the bicycle.”

- Elizabeth West, Hovel in the Hills (via SFBC)

It’s not getting any smarter out there. You have to come to terms with stupidity, and make it work for you.

- Frank Zappa