Say, is that a long tail in your pocket?

2006-08-09T08:58:00.000-07:00

Or are you just glad to see me? Ha. Get it? Well, I'm sure you know me. I'm the Editor-in-Chief of Wired, the most important publication on the planet. People ask me sometimes, what is Wired? And I say, Well, we're sort of like CNET, only more pretentious and we print on paper. And we have stories where the type goes around in circles instead of being arranged in columns. Or sometimes we run the type along the very edges of the paper, up one side, across the top, down the other, then across the bottom, in a little teensy typeface that you need a magnifying glass to read. But you're not supposed to read it, geddit? That's the point. That we're unreadable. Sort of like The Atlantic Monthly. Only we do it on purpose. We also use many different very bright colors, weird candy colors like you see on cars in Europe which by the way is where I was born. I'm also the author of The Long Tail, a book whose main premise recently was thoroughly and categorically proven to be false by the Wall Street Journal and yet continues to sell like hotcakes. So much for the power of Old Media! Or the truth for that matter. Or "facts." Seriously. And by the way, Lee Gomes? Suck my ass, mate. I mean it. The long-tail theory is just one of those things that people know is true, even if someone comes along and proves it wrong. In that way it is very much like a lot of things from the world of physics. You ever seen a Z boson? Me neither. But I believe they exist. Anyway. I'm now working on a sequel about the short tail which argues exactly the opposite of what The Long Tail argues. I think this short tail business could be the next big thing. More on that later. Right now I'm just excited to be blogging with Steve Jobs and his Dream Team. At the very least it will be another way for me to hype myself, er, promote the great work that the team at Wired is doing.

Wired? You Bet I Am

Say, is that a long tail in your pocket?