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Flippant Remarks about www.blackweb20.com

Buy this book at Amazon.com! There are literally billions of “fans” of some form of Rock and Roll all over the planet Earth. Just because an “isolated” fraction of these “fans” know with names and dates that the birthplace of Rock and Roll lies firmly in African hands stolen into North America does not mean that I should be “careful” about telling this truth early and often (out of “love” and not “hate”). The only reason why I should be “careful” about historical matters like this is because members of my family will be murdered in cold blood as a consequence—and for those of you who actually study Black history (which means you are a superior student of American and world history) you know that I am not coming out of left field with talk about murder threats.

When Black Web 2.0 released “Dos and Don’ts for the New Year,” they are essentially telling the Black web world to be “careful” about telling any truths—not because we might be lynched—but because we need to be inclusive as “the Internet is universal.” You see, kids, the implication is that “we” are reading Black Web 2.0 because we need information about starting a business on the Internet. Well, son, I read Black Web 2.0 just like I skim through Bossip: I have no intention of role modeling anything I see at these sites—but I still need to know what is going on in the world of Negro Mediocrity. No man is an island… Why did I just write the words ‘Negro Mediocrity’? Anyone who thinks a title like “Black Web 2.0” is “innovative, attractive and intuitive” does not truly know in their soul the history of Rock and Roll.

Buy this book at Amazon.com!My number one lesson learned from the history of Rock and Roll is that Black people innovate and the so-called “white” people impersonate—not the other way around. Any Black people who want to start a business like Twitter or a business like Facebook might as well call themselves “white” as they are making a false distinction trying to “self-segregate” under the label “Black.” They might as well become vice president of something in a traditionally white-owned company, get a cover story on Black Enterprise magazine and call it a day.

I don’t need to go into too much detail when I’m critiquing Black Web 2.0. Ed Dunn does the job for me in “Black Web 2.0: A Lesson in Anachronism.” I can just take one or two sentences from their “advice” and put them back in the Bossip pile. Here is one:

“The internet is universal.” First of all, I saw this animated map of the globe on the Google campus. Areas of the globe were lit indicating search traffic and most of Africa was literally the Dark Continent. This is the first indication that the Internet is not universal. Here in the rasx() context, what is more accurate is to say that Internet is becoming almost entirely commercial. And the assumption that Black Web 2.0 makes is that Black people get on the Internet solely for the purpose of making money (which can actually be an insulting assumption). And anyone who wants to run a business needs to be politically savvy enough to avoid insulting potential customers.

Here is another bit of advice from Black Web 2.0:

“Don’t define blackness.” Who on Earth can run a successful business on the Internet by defining Blackness? The Nation of Islam? Show me the Black site that pulls this one off… As far as I know, I am the only online writer in the wired world who is “stupid” enough to define Blackness online. I wrote this little ditty called “Basic Black: The Funky Sutra.” Hold your breath for my initial public offering.

The subtitle of the Black Web 2.0 Blog is, “Covering Web 2.0 Trends on African-American Websites and in African-American Culture.” The use of the word “culture” is just lazy, informal American language. The use of the Bill O’Reilly term “Web 2.0” is lame by white (“mainstream”) standards. Shucks, just check out this two-part interview from the almost-played-out Scobleizer himself: “Part I, Tim O’Reilly steers us to a post-web-2.0 world” and “Part II, Tim O’Reilly steers us to a post-web-2.0 world”—these titles suggest anything to you?

Here are a few informal bullets for Black Web 2.0:

  • What’s going on with Ice Cube’s Silverlight-based project? I searched Black Web 2.0 for “ice cube” and got zero results.
  • Is there any news about Black banks and their Web sites—like, say, One United Bank? How many “mainstream” banks make the Web 2.0 grade?
  • Is there a list of the top 10—okay—the top 5 Black Web 2.0 sites that I can find on the site? Are there any running numbers showing serious research metrics about “the black web” on Black Web 2.0? Please, no data from compete.com. Buy this Book at Amazon.com! Lynne D. Johnson is, in my opinion, the best writer for Black Web 2.0. Sadly, she has only 25 articles contributed for the entire existence of Black Web 2.0. Her “mainstream” connections to FastCompany.com probably has her very busy.

Mario Armstrong is heroically one man versus Engadget.com. His “Black edge” is not distinguishing his work from the “mainstream.” His presence looks like a team addition that simulates Om Malik’s gigaom.com moves.

Markus Robinson is the second-best writer for Black Web 2.0. His contributions appear to actually identify people of color more than his colleagues. He contributes almost as many articles as the founder, Angela Benton.

Cub reporter Jade E. Davis wrote the article that pissed me off enough to write this Blog post. I’m pleased that “Dos and Don’ts for the New Year” was not written by Angela Benton or Markus Robinson.

Fredric is the most technical writer at Black Web 2.0. He even wrote a post about grep. His love affair with Drupal is admirable but this is a WordPress Blog. I’m pretty sure that Black Web 2.0 runs on Drupal so his presence makes sense.

Why do I think that Bossip.com alone makes more money than all ventures of Black Web Media LLC combined? Are there any numbers to correct me on this?

Comments

ed, 2008-12-31 18:07:48

Most of Africa like many other places rely heavily, very heavily on mobile services like SMS.

But I agree that you cannot say the "Internet is Universal" - that is clearly inexperience talking. This talk mimics Silicon Valley/Berkely thinking. My point I've been stressing is the "Internet is Diverse" and the strategy is to be able to leverage the nature of the diversity.

I haven't read their article yet but the two points you mentioned "The Internet is Universal" and "Don't Define Blackness" is hilarious coming from a site that calls itself "Black Web 2.0"

rasx()