Clash of the blahgs
"Imitation is the sincerest of flattery"
-Charles Caleb Colton
Blogs, that relatively new form of free communication, come in many different forms. Some of those are valuable commentary; personal online diaries; cultural critiques and reviews, and jeremiads of varying effectiveness.
When http://www.artblahg.blogspot.com/ first came on the scene, through a titillating email sent out to various arts-related people in Philadelphia, I first wrote it off as being childish, shrill and the anonymous rantings of a severely disenfranchised person. In order to allow it some credence, I did go back fairly far in the archival postings recently, and managed to find some sincere and valuable advice to artists who wanted to get noticed, and what they might try doing (search for We Listen to Our Critics, January 12th, on the site). All the vitriol (couched in pseudonyms and obscenities) against what artists such as myself and the co-op gallery I'm part of are trying to do in this city aside, there may be some value to what this blog and the person(s) behind it are doing. Even though I find the medium personally distasteful, since I stand behind civility and professionalism as being ultimately more effective, I'll still allow that there may be some value to what they are trying to communicate...along with their free speech rights, and all that. Hopefully, personal attacks will motivate those of us pilloried by this blog on to even more and better work. So, kudos when that is accomplished.
But then http://www.theartblahg.blogspot.com/ came along, and in a somewhat ham-handed attempt at an expose (I think? I'm still not sure) risked making even more of a mockery of the whole ridiculous thing. Pointless? Perhaps...but it has made me think, and for that I thank them, with a caveat. Taking up a pseudonym for yours truly (among other artists and writers) such as Wim Gershits, and then writing false comments and posting them with a link to this actual blog which attempts a stab at seriousness and will always remain open, not anonymous? This is clumsy, if it is an attempt to get back at the original blog, and pisses me off somewhat...but I'm still hoping that all of this leads to something better, for all of us and for the city's art scene. Granted, having grown up in a small town milieu, it comes off as being another example of an insider quibbling over crumbs, a pattern that one may find in many small towns. (Of course, if I get a flood of comments on this, it might give me an indication if anyone actually reads this blog!)
Still, I'll repeat, if it spurs us all on to better things and better work (and maybe even some adult dialogue), then I suppose I'll see it as a stone in the oyster. It remains to be seen if the pearl produced is worth anything, though.
Posts
Tim-
We will remove said comment(s) if you would like. We publish all comments to the blog and do not comment as anyone other than administrator.
"risked making even more of a mockery of the whole ridiculous thing" ....hopefully.
Thanks for the response...no need really, to remove them; now that you've responded this way, I have confirmed that theartblahg is a response to artblahg. Which is fine.
The Real New Artblahg,
Dear Vimmy,
Thanks for the compliments but you don't go far enough. We have invented a new Web 3.0 orientation that transcends all the olde models. We are from the future which we can do because we are ghosts (ghost writers), har!!!! This is an amazingly strong vehicle to combat the corpo elite machine which has sucked all the life out of the art scene locally and internationally. You know all about that because you work for it.
All the problems with what we call scamtwitting, (stealing other's identities for commenting) started with the losers you are endorsing here when they used our ID in the comment section of Shitypaper. We suspect you have been involved in this from the start, but whatever, because they are a retrograde version of us with no content other than a free frenz banner ad service, which koinkydikily your wittle group sits at the top-o-dee-page of!!!!!!!! Yippee!!!!!!
We copied this wittle response and will publish it on our blah*g. You probably are doing this so you will generate some hits and comments by drafting our stinky fumes just like your frenz at that piece-o-crap other drafting snog.
You boyz outta get your own interweb gigs. Whaddsamadder, got no ideas?!!!!!! We see you said the crappy artsnog could leave your link up, why?, because you like the attention why else. The same reason you embarrass yourself on yeOLDEartblog on every post they make. You probably wrote your own response above too from administrator, hee, hee!!!!!
Oye, as for dis snog, If you want to put people to sleep you are doing a fine job. You need to realize that ever media/medium has it's limitations. super long strait forward text with no styling and few para breaks does not make for good reading on a back lite monitor. Pictures good, ideas good, long rambling text bad. This comment is too long and we are berry, berry sorry, bout it!!!!
lovvveeeeeeeeeeee ya!!!!!!! H+H