Pamphleteering and the Online Experience

Ever since the age of the printing press, anyone with an Idea and the Means to Publish has contributed to the art of the Pamphlet. These small booklets, leaflets, scrolls, et cetera proclaim, defame, exclaim, espouse, denounce, renounce, posit and negate just about Anything in the world, known or yet to be known. Pamphlets were the pre-eminent pre-broadcast means of spreading the memes, the ideas of the day, read by those that needed entertainment, material for discussion, or most likely both. Some became classics, such as Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal". Most were lost to the obscurity of time and the idea presented.

For better or worse, the world wide web has democratized the pamphlet, providing a bully pulpit for anyone with a keyboard, internet access, and the desire to have one's ideas and opinions known. Yes, the democratization happens; but is this a good thing?

I think of democratization much in the same way I view the possession of bladed objects. Centuries ago, both the pen and the sword cost more than the average person could afford. The pen -- or most specifically, the ability to wield one -- was a reflection of a rare and likely expensive education; the sword a handcrafted piece of finery in the day when any metalwork was cherished. Even basic swords cost as much in the Middle Ages, for example, as luxury automobiles today. Like knives today, education is rampant. In any given city in developed nations, it's nearly impossible to drive your sword-priced car without having to slow for a school zone. Many -- nay, most -- emerge from alongside these slow zones with the training necessary to compose and print a sentence or two in their native language -- just as people today have access to blades of every ilk.

However, as anyone who has tried to whittle a statuette or wooden spoon can attest, possession of a knife does not a carver make.

Think, then, of the millions of personal websites and blogspaces currently in existence. Most contain words. Many of those manage to organize the words therein into sentences. And from several of those sentenced sites the average reader can glean an idea -- sometimes more than one.

Imagine if each of these posted ideas were a wooden spoon, crafted with as much skill and care as the words within the site are composed and presented.

Now gather these imagined spoons. Judge them as you would judge any spoon. Is it ornamental or utilitarian? How many spoofuls would it take to get a decent mouthful of soup? Would you even want to put it in your mouth? If you were forced to eat with it, what would the food taste like? Is the surface finely polished, or mostly bark? Over time, would you be starved, maintained, or engorged using the spoon? Die a slow death from oral splinters? A fast death? When you gaze into the ladle, do you see your reflection as a tightly-grained funhouse mirror image? Can you even tell which side was meant to be the handle?

Finally, we should group all of these spoons based upon judged quality.

To the rightmost side of the rankings we should place the most elegant spoony creations, those we would hang on the wall to admire rather than taint with mere, vulgar food.

To the leftmost go the kindling.

And what, in the final analysis, has this camel-humped pile of imaginary spoons proven? Thanks to the democratization of idea publishing, on any given day there should be as many utensils on either extreme end of the pile as there were total pamphlets available in all of Europe and North America in the year history shows publishing reached its height.

Proponents of democratization and the world wide web in general will hail the beautiful soup cradles rightmost of the pile. They will stand in awe over these carvings, endlessly crowing about the magnificence of the discovered gems and the medium that enabled their creation.

Me? I will gesture to the left as I check my right pocket for a lighter.