Thursday, May 01, 2008

I have this little quote

From Warren Ellis - from some interview he did a little while ago. I printed it out, and cut the paper so I could have it lying around making clutter in the vast kitchens of the Casa Aloha Resort and Spa. (soon to be casino - but I have some legal hoops to jump thru to prove I'm part Native American - but that's another, and hopefully massively profitable, story. Anyhoo - the part of the quote I like best is the last bit, which goes like this.

"The motor of innovation and novelty is really kind of cranked up right now, but, in contrast, the general culture is still in a sort of post-millennial shock, just laying there and drooling over its nipples."

There's something really important in there...I can feel it. I can sense it. He's right, but, I just can't quite get my head around what it is, or what it means.


According to the free online encyclopedia "...culture is generally refers to patterns of human activity and the symbolic structures that give such activities significance and importance."

Well, that's rather vague...but maybe that's the point. Trying to reimagine, reinvent, or just create new symbolic structures that give meaning to patterns of human activity ain't like doing yer laundry. It's (seems to me) about creating something (art, relationships, organizations, I dunno...add yers here) that is not only understandable to a vast majority of the population, but is powerful enough to fundamentally alter the meaning of how people relate to the world around them.

Yeah, well, that's a stab at it. I'm not saying that's correct, nor am I saying if it is correct, that I have any idea of how to make something that powerful, much less make something that powerful, that would actually work. I just wanted to shoot this into the webmonster, for consideration.

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