Dave Winer is a bright man and has made some substantial contributions to the web and technology but lately he has become more senseless noise than anything else. Whether it be from his self-promotional claim of being a racist to his piece today railing against Wikipedia it is all beginning to sound more and more like whining desperation to stay relevant.

I have read Dave’s blog since almost day one of my getting involved with blogging. I subscribed to his Twitter feed the moment I found he had one; which wasn’t returned but that’s okay I understand I’m not important enough to warrant his attention. I also subscribed to him on FriendFeed when he made that available and the same with Disqus.

But that has changed as in the last little while I have unsubscribed from everything but his blog because the message - the conversation was becoming even more disjointed than valuable. Which is too bad because on the whole I had enjoyed the conversations that developed around Mr. Dave and his opinions.

When I first read his piece today where he bitch slaps Wikipedia once again for what he refers to as the vendetta against him and his accomplishments I felt the whiney line had been crossed for the last time. Now Mathew Ingram in his professional best wrote a post about what Dave had written, upon which Dave promptly jumped into the comments and called Mathew a hateful person and that he should be careful.

Well… regardless of the fact of whether or not there is a vendetta; which Frank Shaw suggests there is in the Wikipedia discussion area of Dave’s page, Dave doesn’t appreciate it when anyone comes out with an opinion that is counter to how he perceives himself. Now as much as I wanted to comment on all this I couldn’t seem to find the right hook for how this mess made me feel.

Then I was reading a post over on Deus Ex Malcontent where Chez was having a eloquent dissection of the Sarah Jessica Parker and Maxim spat that is going on. In his piece he used the allegory of the movie Smokey and The Bandit (1 & 2) to prove one of his points of his piece. As he puts it

The whole thing comes to a head in what I think is the pivotal moment in this particular story arc — the scene to which I’m referring.

At one point, the Bandit is forced to stop for gas — Trans-am drivers were familiar with this necessity — and that’s where he gets into a row with a clerk whom he believes is guilty of an unforgivable transgression: While the guy does, in fact, know just whose presence he’s being graced by — he’s aware of the Bandit’s status as a celebrity — he doesn’t give a shit. He thinks the Bandit’s an arrogant asshole. This snub causes the Bandit to throw a juvenile tantrum, grabbing the clerk by the throat and shouting in his face: “Women love me! Little kids love me! Now you’re gonna love me or I’m gonna kick your ass!”

That one line says everything you need to know about how those who’ve been in the spotlight too long — who’ve gotten used to the warm and comforting glow of perpetual adulation — can come to feel about themselves and their place in the cultural strata.

It’s called believing your own hype.

That’s when I clicked on the whole thing with Mr. Dave.

He has become self-absorbed in his own hype.

Whether or not it is deserved doesn’t matter anymore as he has created such a negative infrastructure around which to try and base a conversation that conversation is no longer an option.

Which is a sad thing because I am sure that Dave still has many things that he could contribute but due to this constant need to bolster his importance he thinks he has to do, any conversation will be centered around what he has or hasn’t done in the past - not what his doing now or could do in the future. In this case Dave has become his own worst enemy.

On top of that he is giving cranky old farts the world round a bad name. Take a vacation Dave - go sit on the beach in Hawaii - enjoy the scent of the mahalo flowers while sipping on something long, cool and refreshing. Even though my opinion counts for squat in your rarified world and you will probably label me as being hateful - like you did to Mathew - I still think you could have a lot to offer.

Conversation Tags: Dave Winer, hype