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A selection of my published work since 2001 is available here. Contact me with any specific requests.

Linkblog

Kevin Kelly on a fascinating concept called scenius. As defined…

Kevin Kelly on a fascinating concept called scenius. As defined…

Kevin Kelly on a fascinating concept called scenius. As defined by Brian Eno:

Scenius

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Linkblog

Blessed are the list makers, with their sharp pencils, their certainties, their mix of words and numbers. Walt Whitman made lists. Nabokov made lists. Last year, while declaring in Time magazine that “literary lists are basically an obscenity,” Tom Wolfe admitted to having made many in his life, and then introduced a new one, ranking the best novels in the world.

Blessed are the list makers, with their sharp pencils, their certainties, their mix of words and numbers. Walt Whitman made lists. Nabokov made lists. Last …

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For me, as for others, the Net is becoming a universal medium, the conduit for most of the information that flows through my eyes and ears and into my mind. The advantages of having immediate access to such an incredibly rich store of information are many, and they’ve been widely described and duly applauded. “The perfect recall of silicon memory,” Wired’s Clive Thompson has written, “can be an enormous boon to thinking.” But that boon comes at a price.

For me, as for others, the Net is becoming a universal medium, the conduit for most of the information that flows through my eyes and …

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Quercy Ejf Restaurant (4/5) on Yelp.com

Quercy Ejf Restaurant (4/5) on Yelp.com
Idiosyncratic, charismatic but daffy—that could describe the menu, staff or service here. I was more charmed than some will …

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One might do worse than to say that an intellectual is someone who does not attempt to soar on the thermals of public opinion. There ought to be a word for those men and women who do their own thinking; who are willing to stand the accusation of “elitism” (or at least to prefer it to the idea of populism); who care for language above all and guess its subtle relationship to truth; and who are willing and able to nail a lie. If such a person should also have a sense of irony and a feeling for history, then, as the French say, tant mieux. An intellectual need not be one who, in a well-known but essentially meaningless phrase, “speaks truth to power.” (Chomsky has dryly reminded us that power often knows the truth well enough.) However, the attitude towards authority should probably be sceptical, as should the attitude towards utopia, let alone to heaven or hell. Other aims should include the ability to survey the present through the optic of a historian, the past with the perspective of the living, and the culture and language of others with the equipment of an internationalist.

One might do worse than to say that an intellectual is someone who does not attempt to soar on the thermals of public opinion. There …

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How to get involved in TED Prize wishes

How to get involved in TED Prize wishes
Since it began in 2005, the TED Prize has been making wishes that call on the power …

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Creative Underclass: Why Does Gawker Hate You, Keith Gessen?

Creative Underclass: Why Does Gawker Hate You, Keith Gessen?…

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Maoz (4/5) on Yelp.com

Maoz (4/5) on Yelp.com
Astonishing: Maoz is easily my all-time favourite chain “fast food” concept in NYC. It beats out some indie folks like Mamoun’s …

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