Geodog

Blaming the arrangement of the Titanic's deck chairs for its sinking

In a much ballyhooed essay, Clay Shirky suggests that social software bears some of the responsibility for Dean's loss in Iowa and New Hampshire. David Weinberger, who has a good looking new blog at Corante, thinks the idea is dangerous speculation at best, and perhaps nonsense at worst. I agree. Blaming social software for Dean's loss is like is blaming the arrangement of deck chairs on the Titanic for its sinking.

Most Americans still get the vast majority of their news from TV, and I think you have to look first at the idiotic and sometimes vitriolic press coverage of Dean (build him up so you can beat him down, "is he electable", the scream, etc.), plus Dean's own stumbles, for reasons for the failure of his insurgent campaign to do as well as the media predicted he would. Occam's Razor would suggest that is sufficient.