jude folly

Nay sayers dismiss Wikipedia because it’s free and because anyone can contribute to it. So the conventional reasoning goes: what reliable information could emerge from such a den of  nihilism?

I like to think of Wikipedia as an epistemological pun: by its massive dimensions (it has 3,022,714 entries as of 2 Sept. 2009), it sounds encyclopedic, yet it mostly lacks the scholarly bona fides of an academic publication.

Mostly, except that early in its history, the web site appropriated entries from the 1911 edition of Encyclopedia Britannica, which, as Nicholas Baker points out in his review of Wikipedia: The Missing Manual, is no longer protected by copyright law. He describes in detail the inner workings of the massively popular resource and how the manual’s author, John Broughton, gives readers clear, direct advice on wading into the wild, roiling fountain of information that is Wiki.

Accounting for the key factor in all big internet successes (email, AOL chat, YouTube and Facebook, to name a few), Baker explains, ‘they hook you because they are solitary ways to be social: you keep checking in, peeking in, as you would to some noisy party going on downstairs in a house while you’re trying to sleep.’

Like any culture that seeks to establish and maintain order, Wikipedia features an assortment of guardians, judges and mayhem makers. As an example, Baker cites the Pop-Tart page; an entry that endured a variety of revisions over the span of months.

Pop-Tarts were discontinued in Australia in 2005. Maybe that’s true. Before that it said that Pop-Tarts were discontinued in Korea. Several days ago it said: ‘Pop-Tart is german for Little Iced Pastry O’ Germany.’ Other things I learned from earlier versions: more than two trillion Pop-Tarts are sold each year. George Washington invented them. They were developed in the early 1960s in China. Popular flavors are ‘frosted strawberry, frosted brown sugar cinnamon and semen.’ Pop-Tarts are a ‘flat Cookie.’ No: ‘Pop-Tarts are a flat Pastry, KEVIN MCCORMICK is a FRIGGIN LOSER notto mention a queer inch.’ No: ‘A Pop-Tart is a flat condom.’ Once last fall the whole page was replaced with ‘NIPPLES AND BROCCOLI!!!!!’

While he acknowledges the tempestuous quality of Wikipedia revisions, Baker writes that the malicious changes are swiftly fixed by the team work of volunteer editor andd antivandalism software. And without its vandals, he adds, ‘Wikipedia would never have been the prodigious success it has been. . . .’

Dipping in a bit deeper into the Wiki realm as a volunteer editor, Baker learns of an elevated social order wherein a struggle between inclusionists (Wikipedians who strive to save articles marked for deletion) and deletionists (Wikidpedians who assert a narrower definition of notability). If a particular entry can be propped by references to external sources, then it stands a chance of surviving.

Though this struggle may display cruder tactics than in the battles taking place at the university over the scope and limits of knowledge, Wikipedia merits admiration for openly displaying that learning and knowing is an ever evolving process.

The 50th anniversary edition of William Burroughs’ Junky includes, among other treats, a glossary defining some of the terminology used by the addicts, pushers and various other unsavory characters trafficking the underworld of post-war New York, New Orleans and Mexico City. Very appropriately the glossary introduction acknowledges the influence of ‘jive talk’–a language that defined the community of marijuana users (and I would guess jazz musicians who overlapped with potheads)–and ultimately merging with those considered ’hip’ (see glossary below).

To quote the introduction more directly, “Jive talk always refers to more than one level of fact”–to which I would add that this dialect of American English inscribed a code for the essential business of scoring the next fix, as well as illustrating much of the associated activities and consequences of getting high.

are you anywhere? (Do you have any junk or weed on you?) That this question should ring philosophical, even existential, cuts to the heart of the user’s raison d’être. I would imagine an outsider’s possible response to such a question–”Are you high?”–proportionally ironic.

burn down (To overdue or run into the ground.)  The glossary cites a scenario when junkies gathering too frequently at a particular eating establishment to score, that law enforcement eventually gets wise to it. The restaurant in question is then considered “burned down.”

croaker (A doctor.) As described in Junky‘s text, one willing to prescribe a junky his fix. Burroughs elaborates on the type of physician a user will seek out.

Generally speaking, old doctors are more apt to write than young ones. Refugee doctors were a good field for a while, but the addicts burned them down. Often a doctor will blow his top at the mere mention of narcotics and threaten to call the law.

Doctors are so exclusively nurtured on exaggerated ideas of their position, that generally speaking, a factual approach is the worst possible. Even though they do not believe your story, nonetheless they want to hear one. It is like some Oriental face-saving ritual (pp. 17-18).

hep or hip (Someone who knows the score. Someone who understands ‘jive talk’; someone who is ‘with it.’) I believe any thoughtful observer of popular culture will acknowledge how this term has become orphaned from its origins and yet signifies the past fondly.

lush-worker(A thief who specializes in robbing drunks on the subway.) An economist accounting for the cash flow operating in the drug trafficking system in Manhattan (circa 1950) would have to account for the capital generated by preying on the intoxicated upwardly mobile.

poke (A wallet.) The pot o’ gold at the end of the rainbow for your vigilant and industrious lush-worker. An example among several others when a specific action–poking around someone’s pockets–becomes a noun.

pop corn (Someone with a legitimate job, as opposed to a hustler or a lush-worker.) I suspect there’s a glint of insult in this term for someone with one foot in the “square” world and the other among the “hip.”

smash (Change, money, coins.) Another example of an action–in this case the destruction of coin-operated machines, to raise money for a fix–transformed by usage into a noun.

Often the terminology of a marginal community I have found equally amusing and intriguing. The amusement is self evident. The intrigue I owe to the mystery of appropriating accepted usage for a purpose quite far removed; to effect the function of concealing and revealing at the exact same moment; always referring “to more than one level of fact.”