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The increasingly inaccurately-named blog of journalist and futurist Chris Taylor. Either the most sporadically brilliant amateur blog, the most brilliantly amateur sporadic blog, or the most amateur sporadic brilliance on the Web since 2001.
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Daily Blah FAQ
Who are you?
I'm the newly-appointed Future editor at Business 2.0 and the former San Francisco correspondent for Time Magazine.
Wow, so does this mean everything you write reflects Time Inc's opinion? Or do you perhaps have some sort of standard disclaimer to the effect that it doesn't?
Naturally, the opinions contained in this blog are not those of my employers. In fact, some opinions may be the polar opposite of my employers. Some may be the same, for all I know. Hey, it's not like I ask my employers their opinions about everything in the news, okay? Let's just say that if this were a Venn diagram with one circle marked "my opinions" and the other one marked "my employers' opinions", there would doubtless be some overlap. But neither I nor my employers are able to pinpoint exactly where that overlap is.
What is this Daily Blah thing?
An experiment for a column I wrote about blogging back in December 2001. All these years later, I haven't been able to kick the habit.
Do you write any other blogs, by chance? Could that have something to do with the fact that Daily Blah isn't always Daily?
Yes -- the Future Boy blog for Business 2.0. And yes. If you want true, editorially-mandated daily coverage from me, that's probably the best place to look.
Mister, you talk funny. Are you one of them furrners?
Why yes I am, as it happens. I was born, raised and educated in Great Britain. I've been living in the U.S. since 1996 and identify as British.
I say, old chap, you forgot the "u" in "colour."
No I didn't. I may identify as British, but I am also an American journalist writing for an American audience about mostly American issues. These two different sides of me are a constant source of tension. Nevertheless, Daily Blah will adhere to American English grammar and spelling.
Praise for Daily Blah:
"It is fun to watch the author's navel-gazing joy." - Sunday Times (UK)
"It's really funny and informative." - Dave Eggers, author
"The Blah is becoming a daily destination for me." - Richard Marsh, Playwright
"I like it, and I don't." - Fiona Hogg, Teacher
"Better than Xanax." - Lessley Andersen, journalist
"Dude, lay off the crack pipe." - Souris Hong-Porretta, gamesmith
Friends, Bloggers, Countrymen ... lend your ears to these people. I come not to bury them, but praise them.
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My TIME articles
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Daily Blah for... Tuesday, January 10, 2006
Dream Journal Archives: Chickenball
Lengthy dream of a children's soccer tournament held in New York. Actually, it wasn't soccer so much as indoor/outdoor street football, very rough and urban with lots of windy stairs and corridors in the area of play. There were less than five, possibly as few as three, players on each side. It was the final, held between one team of younger kids, utter underdogs, and another team so overly confident, so favored to win, that their inevitable rise to the top was being chronicled by filmmaker Kevin Smith.
The underdogs won, of course, but in a surprising manner: they exploited an obscure rule that allowed them to substitute anything they wanted for the ball after it had gone out of play. Knowing that one of the opposing players, a tall gangly girl, was also a vegetarian, they substituted a raw chicken. Then, in a spectacular slow motion kick, the underdog striker wrong-footed the opposing keeper and sent the chicken flying into the back of the net. Clinging on desperately for the last few minutes, they eked out a 1-0 victory.
The chicken substitution was hugely controversial, but no less a luminary than Donald Trump told me he was going to stand up for the winners in whatever legal battle lay ahead. I nodded and went to tell Kevin Smith not to worry: he had the perfect documentary. (6/13/05)
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