Fear of links
BY SCOTT ROSENBERG
(05/28/99)

Although I would be happy to be a proper coathook for any story Scott Rosenberg wrote, he might have checked with me before he hung his report on my words.

While it might seem a delicious bit of irony that a Wall Street Journal reporter who covers the Internet thinks of online reporters as boobs, I am sorry to say that it is not true. I have huge respect for online reporters and am impressed on a daily basis by their work.

What I don't like and never will is reporters who do not check something out before writing it as truth. At the conference, when I used the term "linkalists," I was referring to putting links for buying things into stories about products, like reviews. I was also making the point that there was so much stuff out on the Web that it was harder for the average user to discern what was quality and what was not, unlike traditional media fare, which is much more settled (some say atrophied).

I only observed that the easy and sometimes too-seamless links between commerce and editorial on the Web were something we all should consider carefully. I did not say links should not happen, but that everyone concerned with the blurring of the lines should think about it. And that users of the Internet have to be as discerning as they are with offline media (or not, if they choose).

In addition, the linkalist term was used as a joke (I think it was funny since people laughed) and I quickly followed it up by saying how much I admired work at places like News.com and theStreet.com.

I admire the work of reporters online, and I am fascinated and encouraged with the way the Internet is evolving. If I wasn't, I would not be spending my life writing about it.

-- Kara Swisher
Reporter
The Wall Street Journal

SCOTT ROSENBERG RESPONDS ...

Nowhere in my article did I suggest that Kara Swisher "thinks of online reporters as boobs." I simply quoted her use of the word "linkalist" as an example of a mainstream journalist's apparently dismissive attitude ("a joke") toward those online writers who devote themselves to providing links to their users, rather than using the Internet as a conduit to deliver traditional reporting. The value in those linking endeavors was the subject of my column.

Naked city?
BY RON FEEMSTER
(06/01/99)

Your article about the humiliating strip-searches that were routine at New York's central booking jail until a lawsuit was filed, has only reinforced something I've felt for some time -- that New York City under Rudy Giuliani is no place I want to visit. It's not drugs or crime or other big-city hazards that make me feel this way; it's the cops I'm scared of.

-- Steve Teeter

Surely you jest when you report Goodman's statements that more than 100,000 strip searches constituted a "bureaucratic" snafu. Nothing like blaming the "system." This comes from the law-and-order, individual-responsibility cretins that populate New York "law" enforcement and the mayor's office? Goodman says: "Sure we violated their rights, but they didn't suffer emotional damage. Let's give them a dollar." Such an admission is as stunning as it is insulting. I think violating citizens' rights is enough, don't you? A few years ago my sister (a former Catholic schoolteacher and nun) was strip-searched at Miami International Airport. She was devastated.

-- Jennifer A. Bell
Sacramento, Calif.

Hard to stomach
BY CHRIS COLIN
(05/28/99)

The oddest behavior of University of California "hunger strikers" that Chris Colin mentions doesn't appear until the third page: They consume Gatorade, that is, food. I myself witnessed this at a UC-Irvine protest; it was one of the many California surrealities that drove me back East, clutching my head.

An equally weird incongruity goes unmentioned by Colin. In Southern California, the act of relaxing with friends while losing weight will sooner arouse envy than pity or indignation. How much more effective would a "gluttony strike" be -- hitherto svelte undergraduates, force-feeding each other corn dogs and Klondike bars, putting on pound after pound of unsightly flab ... why, it would horrify Californians into instant action!

-- Doug McLellan
New York

Sharps & flats
BY AMANDA NOWINSKI
(06/01/99)

Amanda Nowinski writes: "Unfortunately, Orbital's new record, 'The Middle of Nowhere,' will do nothing to challenge that old monotony stigma [associated with techno.]" Well, perhaps not, but I think she's missing the evocative potential of this Orbital record and the ones that have come before it. Orbital is my favorite band, but I've never really "gotten" one of their records until I've heard it at least 10 or 20 times. After enough listens it's not just music anymore, but rather a carrier of the Hartnoll brothers' ideas.

-- Allen Brunson

Nowinski's review is symptomatic of your magazine's treatment of electronic music. While I'll admit that the album falls short of the duo's glory days, Nowinski's review totally misses the point. Orbital and other electronic groups' music isn't so much about melody as about a contrapuntal relationship between rhythm and sound. It's a misunderstanding typical of rock-oriented critics in popular magazines. The repetitive (monotonous in Nowinski's words) nature of electronic music allows DJs mixing 12-inch vinyl to continuously enhance or break up the track's internal counterpoint (the groove). Dance music is in fact no more repetitive than much modern classical music, which derives much influence from the genre.

Out of curiosity, I made an excursion through your music review archives and found a generally negative attitude toward (and gross ignorance of) electronic or dance music as a genre. Dance or electronic music is a viable, self-perpetuating musical subculture, much like jazz or folk. Perhaps you could have people that like electronic music (and understand it) review it instead of disgruntled rock critics.

-- James Crouch
New Orleans

A mother defends Marilyn Manson
BY NANI POWER
(05/28/99)

Someone best keep an eye on Nani Power's kids if Marilyn Manson is what she is subjecting them to. Don't we have enough horror in this world without someone like that fool glorifying the grotesque and making a mockery of everything decent? First Amendment be damned; there is a limit to tolerance of the obscene!

-- LaVonne Otwell
Marietta, Ga.