You need to feed the critics.
Friend Tom sent a message over the holiday weekend which referenced the text of a speech given by Bruce Sterling earlier this year. I went back to read it again, since I remembered enjoying it so much the first time. The post is a multi-front assault on the problem of "the Internet of Things", the importance of language (or, rather, the vocabulary used, what what it invokes and what it evokes), and Bruce's take on the timeline that moves us from ThingLinks, through blogjects, to spimes. (No... you go read it for yourself. I can't possibly do it justice.)
It was a better read this time! But what caught me is a sentiment / statement of principle / credo that really resonates as I consider my next endeavors.
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It's morally wrong to avoid controversies just because you don't want anybody confronting you over what you are doing. There's something snotty about an author who expects only good reviews for his books. The author of an emergent technology is in the same boat. If nobody is dismissing you as hype, then you are not being loud enough. If nobody thinks what you are doing is dangerous, you are doing something that has no power to change the world. You'd better fight it out with words before you fight with laws. You're gonna be in no position to think straight when you suddenly get hauled in front of Congress and confronted for being "evil." You need to feed the critics. Don't feed the crazy ones, but a loyal opposition is hugely valuable.
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