I am not really so sure about this proposition that
Usenet is not reality. That has almost become a
truism for many people. It seems to me that the
assertion needs to be examined in a bit more
detail.
In the first place, words themselves are not reality.
They are essentially symbols. They might be
described in other ways too, but if there is one
word that describes words themselves better than
any other, it is "symbols." Since Usenet is a world
of words, it is also a world of symbols. With that
in mind, one sees that Usenet can never equal the
reality outside these electronic woods, as I
sometimes term our galaxy of newsgroups.
That being sensibly granted, however, when we
are IN Usenet, it becomes our reality until we leave
it and go elsewhere. Right now, for instance, I am
typing this post, so my thoughts are directed toward
Usenet readers. In a very real sense, Usenet is my
reality.
If I get up and go into the other room to see what my
cat is up to, then Usenet is NOT my reality--the other
room and the cat have displaced it.
As you read these words, though, Usenet is your
reality too. That is the way the world of words has
always been.
People say, "That is just a book, it is not reality."
Well, it was someone's reality when it was being
written. It becomes others' reality if it is being read.
People wonder why I say I live an office upstairs
from a newsgroup.
Well, when I am in Usenet, I do live in such an upstairs
office.
I am sitting in that office right now, just up a flight
of stairs above rec.arts.prose. The posters who
nowadays hang out down in rec.arts.prose drove
me up here with their sniping at others and their
annoying vapidity.
So you see, Usenet is not reality...but then
again it IS reality...
accept no cheap imitations:
the alt.genius.bill-palmer
--firing posts at random from a window in the office
above rec.arts.prose
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