Wednesday 31 January 2001

Pic of the day: And of course, there is always The Sims, where you make your own "real life" entertainment show. Sort of. With live Barbie dolls. It probably beats:

Big Brothe...l??

According to national news, Norway is also taking up the Big Brother broadcast concept, in which a number of people are put in a house with lots of cameras. We have already had at least one surveyed house, the name escapes me, but there were a few women there. Evidently television broadcasts choice scenes from people's daily lives, while the lucky people with Internet access can watch them all day and all night. So, uh, what else is new?

It's about three years ago now that a family oriented computer magazine here in Norway had an article on Jennicam. At the time, she had been online 24 hours a day for a while already. I found the concept intriguing, but when I looked for more cam people I found that the real livecams were drowned in a sea of exhibitionist cams (usually heavily loaded with lurid ads). These cams were not at all showing people's lives, but were only online during acting. Blah. Showcams.

Eventually I found another 24 hour webcam, belonging to the super sarcastic queen of bad spelling, the irresistible Debra S. (She seems to have escaped again, last I saw she was travelling the world with her boyfriend.) Anyway, it was she who inspired me to create my JPG diary, which evolved into this journal. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

***

Debs had a column called "Moron Mail". There she posted the most stupid, tactless and insensitive mails she got. Being the overly nice girl she was at heart (but don't tell her I said that), she usually did not include their name and address. Typically they were requests like "plz letme c ur breasts". One guy modestly asked to see her bra, to which she cheerfully replied that she didn't wear one. I'm not sure that made him feel better...

The inimitable GabGabcamcam also posted mailmail, but pretty much unedited. It was also quite interesting. My all time favorite was "I saw a nipple while you sleep". Given the distance from camera and the light, that was quite an accomplishment to be proud of, I agree. But I think you're getting the picture here.

I simply can't help that I'm cynical about the attraction of the latest spycam craze. As I mentioned, the first such show here in Norway included a small number of reasonably young women. 3 or 4 I think. I did not go to their website, and I don't have a TV, but I saw it mentioned often enough. I see that official Big Brother programs are on their way now, and advertisers are not quite sure what to do about it. That alone says a bit about the expectations, don't you think?

I've heard that sex is the only line of business that has given a profit on the Net. Heh. We were afraid technology would bring a Big Brother society - instead we got a Big Brothel.

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I guess in a way, journals like mine are more like the showcams than the livecams. For practical purposes, we simply cannot display our entire life. We have to choose what to expose. I try to vary things, I really do ... sometimes I tell what I eat, sometimes what I think. And so on. But I'm definitely ready to have a webcam too, if Norway eventually gets affordable 24 hours connection to the Internet. Right now those are too expensive for me. Sorry to all those who wanted to enjoy the sight of my handsome self each day ... mail me about sponsoring. Heh.

But do you really believe people who participate in an entertainment program are showing their true colors? It's one thing with someone living under camera for years on end, like Jenni. But if you're hired as entertainment by a television company, I doubt they instruct you to be on your best behavior at all times. The TV companies know what sells. And if they didn't know, they could easily find out on the Net.

A popular online diary can have hundreds of visits a day. (The Chaos Node is not one of those.) But a single porn site can easily compete with the entire Diary registry with its four thousand journals. So, if I were into entertainment business, I'd know where the money was.

Now you may say that I've grown bitter, but of this you may be sure:
The rich have got their channels in the bedrooms of the poor
and there's a mighty judgement coming - but I may be wrong ...
You see I hear these funny voices, in the Tower of Song.

Leonard Cohen, Tower of Song.