Web Design & Development '98 a tradeshow and conference produced by Miller Freeman, Web Techniques and Web Review magazines, took place in San Francisco last week(21 June - 25 June, 1998.) After sitting out tradeshows for over a year, Your Unruly decided to cover this one for GENERATOR 21 and SUITE 101. My reports, a special report, and commentary on new software, will appear at both web publications over the course of this week, in three parts. This is Part Two.

SAN FRANCISCO - You're cruising the Exhibit floor of a tradeshow, you expect to be approached by the usual software vendor flacks, maybe another reporter checking in with you since you last crossed paths, trying to suss your take on the show. Maybe hear your spin in advance. The last thing you expect is that a webmaster will come up to you and pitch his site. Let alone that, as happened last Monday with Srini Kumar of unamerican.com, this guy will introduce his PR flack, Molly Ditmore of c*rcumstanc e, as his "pimp." Their both young. He's of East Indian descent, she's a redhead, probably Irish.

This Reporter reminds Srini that we had talked telephonically, months earlier, when Jeff Winbush(a G21 Staff Writer) first pointed me toward his site. I omit the fact that I never did a site review at Suite101 because --- well, it is not relevant, and I don't want to dampen their enthusiasm.

I promise to give the Press Kit a look see, and maybe be in touch with them.

As the conference evolved, and I began to congeal an idea of how I wanted to cover the future of the Web, I became more and more convinced that Srini's was a story worth telling, especially for other people publishing on the WWW.

So I called Ditmore, asked her to set up an interview and send me some material about her company.

Fast Forward to Tuesday, 30 June, 1998, when I panic because the promised interview has not materialized. I call Ditmore's office, she tells me she hasn't heard from Srini in a week, suggests I e-mail him, asks if I can file my story from the Press Kit. Well, hell yeah, but that was not the point. I can serve up Srini in my words, but most readers would like to get him in his own words. Duh.

The fact is, in most of the press, Web or otherwise, you usually read the story of some young investment banker making a killing by financing an e-commerce site. Other than that, it's all pornography, sports, and offshore gambling that hit the radar screen because of revenues. THINK ABOUT THIS: Unamerican.com is clocking $6,000 a month right now. WITHOUT e-commerce interfaces. Kids all over American put check into envelopes and snail-mail this site money.

BASED ON WHAT?

The fact is, Unamerican has commodified anarchy. By pandering to disaffected youth, these young guys have found a *Marketing* paradigm that works. They sell stickers, t-shirts, coffee mugs with slogans like:

• F**K SCHOOL
• WHITEY WILL PAY
• WE'RE DOOMED
• WAGE-SLAVE
• F**K YEAH I'M WEIRD
• JESUS HATES ME
• I HATE COMPUTERS
• ADULTS ARE DUMB
• NO MORE BULLSHIT
• DESTROY CAPITALISM
• BORED
• MICROSOFT MUST DIE
• F**K WORK
• SHUT UP HIPPY
• SELL ME DRUGS
• I represent GOD you f**k

One of my favorite movie lines of all time is "...How many days have you gone without a rationalization?"[Lawrence Kasdan]

Any thinking person would suggest that Unamerican is part of the system it claims to abhor. That rather than being communitarian, Kumar and company have simply found a fertile vein of angst to tap and are profitting from other people's disaffection.

Kumar's answer to this charge(from the S.F. Weekly article, "Culture Shocked" by Katherine Mieszkowski, 20 - 26 May, 1998):

"We toe the line between irony and hypocrisy every day. That's my job. We want to turn philosophy into a business model."

Our conclusion? Well, there is indeed "gold in them thar hills" if you're willing to leave your ethics at the door. Madison Avenue proved this half a century ago, and now young entrepreneurs like Srini Kumar are implementing the lesson of a commodification society. Though the rhetoric at unamerican.com says that this a wave, a grassroots attempt to subvert the system, it is that very system which allows for a target and a means to make bank.

Meanwhile, Kids, Srini laughs all the way to the bank, and deposits bank, on your disillusionment.

FRIDAY: The conclusion, two software offerings that might make your job easier, WebMaster.

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