Enjoying obscurity.

I quite like the idea that very few people read these pages. It feels like we’re a secret society figuring out a lot of stuff before anybody else does.

The great advantage of the internet is also its greatest problem: the fact that everyone can participate in any discussion at any time. While this often provides for interesting new perspectives on a topic, most of the time, interventions “from outside” defuse the focus and derail the reasoning.

When somebody interferes in a trivial discussion with an original remark, it can liven things up. But when a complex train of thought is being developed on the edge of what is currently thinkable, an intrusion can only result in pulling everything back towards the center, towards the well known, the obvious, the banal.

I don’t think I would enjoy this relative obscurity quite as much if nobody would have the opportunity to know. I would probably still do this -I have in the past- but the joy would be less. But quite a number of people are keeping an eye on Tale of Tales these days. So when we do something small and silent, maybe it gets the delicious flavor of elitism, rather than the potentially pitiful taste of obscurity.

I don’t believe in crowds. I know how powerful they can be. But I do not believe that crowds lead to the best possible outcomes. Not even for themselves. I dislike that our contemporary culture values mob rule so highly. I hope the trend changes soon -I fear for mankind if it doesn’t.

In part, this is why I enjoy this relative solitude: it gives me an opportunity to explore and hopefully illustrate the superiority of dedication and focus over diffusion and consensus.