I hate the Web

I used to write a print column about pop culture for a living before weblogs, aka blogs, existed.

Blogs are pretty much like my column was, except of course that I was edited by people who had my back when it came to spelling, grammar and just plain making sense.

The Web has irrevocably changed the entire culture (insert "no duh" comment here, you know you want to), not just pop culture. Presumably smaller and smaller enterprises can succeed because the Web lowers the bar to entry. This blog, for instance, is a free product. It doesn't cost me anything, except time, to put up. This free content is somehow monetized by the company that gives me the opportunity to put it up.

The big change is that whatever money is made is disconnected from the work that went into providing this content.

That wasn't the case when I did it in print. I was an employee and the monetization of content - essentially the advertising revenue - was passed on to me in the form of a salary, so I was monetizing, too.

The Web is killing print, so that model I used to work under is working for fewer and fewer people at my end of the spectrum. Stars of whatever medium will always be well-rewarded (well, maybe not the stars of poetry in the Western world), but the paying opportunities that used to exist for thousands upon thousands of good writers are rapidly diminishing because the Web is, well, worldwide and creates a downward income curve that seems counterintuitive.

As print-media outlets drastically cut the size of their staffs or fold into oblivion, the Web does not offer localized information sources that have an income model that can support anything like the staffs that had been employed at newspapers and magazines.

The Web detaches place from the business equation.

Oh sure, if you have a business that can only work by being in a brick-and-mortar location, like a restaurant or a bar, you're golden in the age of the Web, and you can actually cut your advertising costs by putting up your own Web site and incorporating the right keywords to drive search-engine users to your local establishment.

But Amazon.com is an example of just the opposite. With modern delivery systems, including real-world services like FedEx and virtual delivery via Kindle, there's no need for a brick-and-mortar location to sell from. All you need is a site that's a glorified mail-order catalog, continuously updated and with a virtually unlimited inventory accessible at a moment's notice. Whether you're searching for an obscure or a popular book, the process is fairly easy and almost the same, and you don't have to go to the store. It's right there at the end of your fingertips.

City magazines and newspapers are place-oriented, and to date they've offered the only viable opportunity to underwrite the cost of gathering news information through primarily local advertising. But now that viability is gone because advertisers - whether Mom-and-Pop businesses, big-bucks corporations or some guy who's trying to sell his old truck - are fleeing to the Web, where results are more immediate, more apparent and less costly.

So while there are plenty of entrepreneurial types who are putting up local Web sites that provide local information, none of them (at least, that I know of) is able to provide more than a few writing jobs and those at relatively low pay.

As Will Dana, managing editor of Rolling Stone, recently wrote in his "Editor's Notes" column: "Maybe Homeland Security should be helping to keep the print media alive. A few years from now, there's a good chance there won't be many newspapers left - if any. So what happens when some cyber-terrorist zaps the Internet or takes out a couple of satellites, and suddenly there's no communications infrastructure? This is not such an outlandish thought - deep in the Pentagon, there are people who do nothing but worry about these things. Aren't you going to wish someone was throwing the paper on your doorstep?"

Copyright © 2009, Salvatore Caputo

Dog days of summer bite snakes

When the Arizona Diamondbacks went on a tear through the National League in the first two months of the season, the question in the back of everyone's mind was, "Are they contenders or pretenders?" When they kept winning through the middle of June, the Diamondbacks seemed to have completely shed the losing skin of 1998. They looked like they were for real. Just like that, though, the questions have resurfaced. The Diamondbacks have gone from a four-game lead in the National League West to three games behind the division-leading San Francisco Giants since mid-June. To win the division or a wild-card seat in the postseason, the Diamondbacks have to buck nearly 40 years of expansion-era baseball history. The Los Angeles Angels, baseball's first expansion team, is the only one (so far) to have a winning record in its second year. (The Angels also set a 70-win record for a debut season.) The general rule has been that expansion teams need to suffer years of losing before breaking through. That rule has been broken in the '90s, though. The Colorado Rockies made it to the postseason in their third year, and the Florida Marlins won the World Series in their fifth season. Despite a spending spree on free agents, last year's Diamondbacks came nowhere close to challenging the Angels' debut-year record. The off-season spending on free agents for 1999, including pitcher Randy Johnson, argues that the team is determined not to let last year's poor performance get in the way of their determination to go to the postseason this year. Energized by the resurgent offense of Matt Williams and Jay Bell and a career year by Luis Gonzalez (all of whom are All Stars this year), the Diamondbacks, after a 0-4 start, became the hottest team in the National League through the middle of June. Then, the Braves, superhot Reds and Cardinals came to Bank One Ballpark, and the team started losing. Sports Illustrated predicted that the homestand would be a reality check for the snakes, and it was. A phantom offense? The blame for the sudden downturn was laid on the bullpen. Blown saves, after all, had been the main reason for the team's bad start. When the team was winning, the offense overcame a number of blown saves. The team clearly needed a better bullpen to reach the postseason. However, if the problem was just in the bullpen, pitcher Randy Johnson, the team's other All Star, would not have been shut out while pitching four strong games in a row. The Diamondbacks have racked up only seven hits in those Johnson starts. Aside from a few nights when they scored in double-digits, the offense has been in a terrible slump since the Braves series, a fact that doesn't help the bullpen or starting pitching. To state the obvious, even though pitchers get the credit for wins and losses, the best they can do is give their teams the chance to win. To win, the offense has to score. The Diamondbacks look as prepared as anyone else in the National League West (except for the amazingly resilient San Francisco Giants) to make it to the postseason, at least on paper. They've got the toughest pitcher in the league in Johnson, one of the leading base stealers in leadoff man Tony Womack, and one of the most potent offenses. They've also made moves to shore up the bullpen -- including a deal that brought steely-eyed closer Matt Mantei over from the Florida Marlins. However, one of those factors -- the potent offense -- was not expected to be there as the season began. Could it be a phantom? The math is against the aging Williams. Even though he was unlikely to have as bad a year as last year, Williams can only expect his numbers to go down from his peak years. Bell, on the other hand, seems to be benefiting from batting No. 2 behind the fleet-footed Womack. Seeing more fastballs from pitchers interested in trying to keep Womack off second base, Bell has set a career record in home runs by the halfway point of this season. Can he keep up that pace, or has he returned to his considerably more mortal of previous years? The evidence so far points more toward the "contender" side of the equation, but that's not a foregone conclusion. The second half should be interesting. Fans certainly have to hope that it's a coincidence that the team started losing just as the hot weather started. Summer lasts a long time in Phoenix. Copyright © 1999, Salvatore Caputo

All houses unholy in Lewinsky affair

A plague on all their houses: Clinton's, the Republicans' and the media's. Now that the verdict's in, I don't feel like I'm trying to be a pundit if I speak my mind. President Clinton deserves all the criticism he gets for his weaseling answers to straightforward questions. "I didn't inhale." Sure, fine. You didn't inhale, but you experimented with marijuana, you held a joint in your hand, which would be illegal in the United States. So you engaged in an illegal activity way back when. Much of your generation of Americans experimented, Mr. President, and they wouldn't bat an eye if you'd said you'd done it. Instead, they squirm because you tried to weasel out of it with a lame excuse. Your dog ate the homework, too, I suppose. If you had been in the United States and the police had caught you holding the spliff, you could have protested that you didn't inhale until you turned blue, but they would have hauled you downtown. "I never had sexual relations with that woman." Sure, fine. Being fellated by a young intern is no more sexual relations than masturbation is, but the whole semantic issue is a misdirection. Fellatio is known more commonly as oral sex. So, whether relations were involved or not, most of us acknowledge that fellatio is a form of sex. President Clinton wouldn't, though. Contrast these denials with candidate Jimmy Carter's avowal that he had lusted in his heart after women. Although lust isn't illegal, admitting to it could have damaged his appeal to his core constituency. Yet, he admitted to his flaws. Given all this, it's understandable that Clinton's political opponents would seize on the president's disingenuous behavior and turn the petty denials of a man who will say anything, however ridiculous, to stay out of trouble into something more sinister. They may be right, but those facts certainly aren't in evidence or the verdict would have gone against Clinton. That the Starr investigation couldn't hang the president except on the idea that Clinton "perjured" himself in the Paula Jones case is either proof that the White House is the most tight-lipped conspiracy on Earth (with the strong implication that Bill Clinton is the smarmiest man on the globe) or that there's plenty of sizzle but no meat. There are probably many healthy American men about Clinton's age who would fantasize about a sexual encounter in the Oval Office. Power is an aphrodisiac, as Henry Kissinger supposedly said. We could only hope that most of them would choose to have the encounter with their wives or, if unmarried, with their longtime girlfriends. Clinton chose to do it with a subordinate, who could have turned on him and charged sexual harassment. It was poor judgment for him to have anything to do with an employee, especially on my dime! Any middle manager with a lick of sense knows enough not to do that, but not the leader of the Free World. Get thee to a one-star motel! The Republicans sin, too The theories fly about why the Republicans wanted to do Clinton in on the measliest of charges. One idea is that this was revenge for Nixon's near-impeachment. The similarities are eerie. If Nixon's sense of decorum wouldn't have been bruised by the idea, he could easily have said "but I didn't inhale." He did, however, say something about not being a crook. When people dismiss the Watergate break-in as a third-rate burglary, they miss its intent. It was part of an effort to, if not rig the 1972 election, to win it at any cost, without regard to the law. Breaking and entering in the defense of your candidate is considerably more like high crimes and misdemeanors than trying to cover up a third-rate affair is. Comedians joked that the Republicans were jealous of all the sex Clinton was getting, but I don't think Monica, Paula or Jennifer would be the belles of any GOP ball. There's also the "Republicans hate Hillary" theory. Hillary Rodham was one of their own long ago, and she converted to the other side. They are personally offended by that and by Clinton's deference to her. When Clinton said that if we elected him, we'd get Hillary for free, he didn't endear himself to the opposition party. Of course, this is the party that gave us Nancy Reagan -- who, like Hillary, was smarter than her husband. The difference, of course, was that Nancy Reagan was publicly deferential to her husband, even if she wielded tremendous influence on him behind the scenes and made him the politician he was. My own theory is that the Republicans are humanity's sorest winners. They lose a few seats in Congress in the mid-term elections and go ballistic. This despite the incontestable fact that they still are the majority party of both houses of Congress, which thanks to our Founding Fathers' checks and balances, means the Republicans wield power that's equal to that of the Democrat sitting in the White House doing all those nasty things. Yet, the party apparently decided they'd been whupped so hard that Newt Gingrich had to go. In addition, they can't stand to look in the mirror. In all things but the way he keeps his zipper up, the president is a moderate Republican, with a tendency to lean right on law and order and economic issues, but just slightly left on social issues such as entitlement. Of course, that last part means he exhibits a considerably less shriveled heart than most Republicans on the campaign trail. It's not that they don't do charitable things, but for the most part they are like the biblical Pharisees, who put on a big show of piety. So, let's tally it up. He cops their rhetoric. He gets more girls than they do. And, worst of all, a large chunk of the populace think he's doing a good job. The general public didn't want him impeached on the House Republicans' superheated claims that Clinton subverted the Constitution by lying under pressure, which many men would have done in similar circumstances. Clinton seemed to have inherited Ronald Reagan's Teflon suit to make him impervious to criticism. For Clinton to have anything in common with the Great Communicator, who was also known to tell a fib or two, must stick in Republican craws. It's the perjury, stupid! Let's take a look at the House managers' perjury argument. Although perjury is a serious offense, I wonder why. The House managers argued that the integrity of the judicial system rests on the belief that you must not lie under oath, and that if the president lies under oath, he must be punished just as any other person in America would be. Sure. This is all true as far as it goes, but they added that perjury by a president would undermine people's faith in the entire judicial system. Pardon me while I laugh. That argument takes as a given that faith in the system exists, that most people actually believe that no one is above the law. Tell that to a gang banger on the streets of Compton. He'll agree wholeheartedly, I'm sure, and he'll add that police never pick on blacks or Latinos. Everyone believes that the rich and the powerful get the same justice as you or I, right? I thought so. (Let me underscore that this is sarcasm, folks.) After Clinton's affair with Monica Lewinsky was uncovered, the general public understood why Clinton lied in this matter and sympathized with his vain effort to protect his family from scandal. The public sympathized even though it was Clinton's actions that brought on the scandal in the first place. They could see themselves in the same position. They figured he was a good president and a flawed human being, but that he was not a criminal. Their desire was that justice, the rule of law, be tempered with mercy. They knew that the House managers were trying to swat a flea with a howitzer. Mercy for Clinton was never in the cards these bitter Republicans held, even though they knew that Richard Nixon had been pardoned after a far more serious case was made against him. Maybe that's why Clinton, unlike Nixon, did not step down as president. Here are some questions I have about lying under oath: If no one is supposed to lie under oath, when defense attorneys know a client is guilty, what do they advise that client to say in court? Do lawyers advise them to tell the whole truth, or do they advise them to put the best spin on the truth? How many arguments would go to court if both sides were telling the truth? In court, the truth is always in question. Why aren't there more findings of perjury, especially in civil matters? Media salivated all along The media held its nose all through this, saying, "Isn't this a terrible story? But it's our job to inform you of every detail," and they dived in to report all the sleaze with gusto. I boycotted TV and newspaper reports about the scandal, and found that even 10 second sound bites on radio still told me more than I needed to know. The president's sexual activity during down time at the Oval Office is not my business. It's clearer now than it has ever been that the news business, despite its stated lofty ideals, is entertainment rather than an instrument of public discourse on issues that matter. The news from Minnesota is not what Jesse Ventura says, but the fact that he is a former pro wrestler turned governor. The news from Washington reduces complex governmental issues into bumper sticker sentiments. That which titillates has precedence over that which enlightens. Copyright © 1999, Salvatore Caputo

Sammy Sosa made Mark McGwire better

The Chicago Cubs' Sammy Sosa, the also-ran of baseball's home-run chase with 66 dingers, was voted the MVP of the National League today. The Baseball Writers' Association members, who did the choosing, were virtually unanimous. The only dissenters among 32 voters who made Sosa their first choice were two scribes from St. Louis. They voted for the only other slugger to hit more than 61 home runs in a season: Mark McGwire of the St. Louis Cardinals. If they hadn't, what would the home crowd have said about them? Without a doubt, McGwire holds the sexiest record in American sports. By hitting 70 home runs this summer, McGwire didn't just break the record held by Roger Maris, he played Godzilla stomping on Tokyo. People can talk about expansion-diluted pitching all they want, but it takes a real slugger to hit moonshots. We'd better hope that none of the balls he hit out of the atmosphere deflect an asteroid our way. For hitting 70 home runs, McGwire was acclaimed the savior of baseball. He helped bring people back to Major League ballparks. To hear wistful baseball fans tell it, McGwire was Babe Ruth and Albert Schweitzer rolled into one. Cheers were heard in parks where only the wind had moaned since the baseball strike of 1994-95. People came in droves to watch the guy take batting practice. They booed if their home-team pitchers wouldn't pitch to him. Clearly, everyone was ready for the record to be broken. Maris set it 37 years ago, breaking Ruth's 60-run record from 1927. Consistent Mark, surprising Sammy McGwire didn't want to talk about the home-run pace he was on. He said that it wasn't worth talking about breaking the Maris record until a player had 50 runs at the beginning of September. In fact, he started getting downright testy in the face of continuous questions about the home-run record. Although he did seem a little happier after he hit 50 by the beginning of September, he seemed hard-pressed to enjoy what he was doing. When McGwire's use of androstenedione, a muscle-enhancing drug, was questioned, he seemed on the edge of losing it. Sosa, on the other hand, seemed to relish attention. He quipped that he took performance-enhancing drugs, too: Flintstone vitamins. In the later stages of the home-run race, commentators all noted the difference between the way Sosa and McGwire took the pressure. Writers speculated that Sosa was grateful because he came up from the poverty of the Dominican Republic. McGwire had been dogged by the press much longer, and maybe Sosa wouldn't have been so happy if he'd been mindlessly asked the same litany of questions every day since spring training. Each year since the strike, people have put money on McGwire to break the home-run record. Sosa, on the other hand, crept up on everyone. A free swinger most of his career, he didn't get much notice as a slugger until he hit 20 home runs in June, setting the Major League record for long balls hit in a single month. In responding to questions after the MVP was announced, Sosa continued to say what he's said all year, that the real MVP and baseball hero this year was McGwire. He humbly accepted it, but gave the impression he didn't get why he should have been voted in over McGwire -- especially in a laugher. So who's the MVP? As do all judgment calls, this MVP award has its boosters and detractors. The debate heated up many a barroom and sports-talk radio phone line. The McGwire boosters say, and rightly so, that McGwire led the charge that made baseball vital to fans again. People who weren't fans knew who McGwire was and kept track of whether he hit one out on any given day. He set records in walks as well as home runs this year. However, most importantly, they argue, if 70 home runs -- a number that still leaves some fans giddy -- doesn't get you the MVP, what will? Sosa's boosters argue that he had a better all-around year than McGwire and helped put his team into the post-season. This argument also holds some water. I can't pretend to know what the baseball writers were thinking when they voted, but I have to agree with their choice. However, not for any of the reasons mentioned before. The X factor Sammy Sosa was the X factor that made the season interesting. The camaraderie that he and McGwire shared seemed to help McGwire lighten up and enjoy the home stretch of the season, just when it appeared he was losing patience with the whole circus. Without Sosa, McGwire's getting the record was virtually an inexorable, foregone conclusion. Imagine what the season would have been like if Sosa wasn't on his heels. Unlike the 1961 race between Maris and Mickey Mantle, neither Sosa nor McGwire was taken out of the running by injury. So there was some question as to who would end up with the home-run record this season. When Sosa hit 66, McGwire's answering shots became more dramatic. Now that it's over, people forget that the race was still on and it was an open question whether Sosa would overtake McGwire. If McGwire had been the only one in it when he hit 62, he probably would have let up. Cardinals manager Tony LaRussa said that McGwire did express relief that it was "over" after he hit 62. If not for Sosa, everybody could have gone home happy that Maris' record was finally broken, and that a new generation of ballplayers finally found their place in the pantheon where Ruth sits. However, the main reason it didn't stop there was Sosa. McGwire racked up 70 because Sosa hit 66. McGwire has the sexy record, and he'll be remembered by far more people for that record than any league MVP ever has been. If McGwire's record was the biggest thing to happen to baseball this year, then Sosa definitely was an MVP for keeping it exciting to the last day of the season. Copyright © 1998, Salvatore Caputo