A Quote by Kenneth Goldsmith

For me, Twitter is a public persona. It's UbuWeb or Kenneth Goldsmith (as opposed to Kenny Goldsmith). I don't interact. It's a lousy form for conversation and opinion (what can you really say in 140 characters?), but a wonderful propaganda and sloganeering tool. I use it as a one-way street.
For me, Twitter is a public persona. I don't interact. It's a lousy form for conversation and opinion, but a wonderful propaganda and sloganeering tool. I use it as a one-way street.
Kenny Goldsmith from Ubuweb describes himself as an amateur archivist, and people can download files from Ubuweb - it's not a streaming service. But it's a miracle that it's still online and they're able to make it work through the donations of server space and volunteer efforts.
I found myself thinking about the distance between the 60s and today through certain moments. Like the Henry Flynt interview with Ubuweb founder Kenny Goldsmith, where he talks about how he was scarred by how proud John Cage was to be ignorant of popular music. Goldsmith says, "Nobody thinks twice nowadays about listening to everything!" Something that had seemed so uniquely, radically syncretistic in Flynt's day seems much more commonplace now.
I like Twitter more than Facebook. Twitter is a great way to deliver and get news. In news writing less is more and 140 characters is great. If you can't grab that headline in 140 characters than it's not a story. Viewers tweet all the time and they tell what stories they like and don't like. It's great to interact with them and get that instant feedback. It's great for the viewer and the journalist.
James Goldsmith is important because he used the power of the markets to break up the cosy patrician elite that ran Britain and its industries in the 1950s and '60s. In the process, Goldsmith helped transfer power in this country away from politics and towards the markets and the financial sector.
I use social media every day. I don't have a Twitter account, but not because I'm a dinosaur about it. I have enough of a platform here. People in my position who do it tend to use it in a promotional way or in a hamstrung way. I look at Twitter all the time as a news tool or for cultural conversation. I've used it in my reporting. It's very useful.
I'm sure there are some commercial applications for Twitter, but they don't really interest me. I mean, 140 characters? I am really not interested in Ashton Kutcher's daily walks. Not for me.
People really do identify with the characters they see on the show, but these days, social media allows you to interact with fans in a really interesting way. On my Twitter account, I'm Chris Carmack, not Will Lexington. I interact with fans and joke with them. I'll post pictures from my life. I think that helps drop the curtain of a character.
Twitter is sort of version of labeling, except with 140 characters instead of a labelmaker. It's the way of calling things out for what they are, wearing badges. Twitter is like the new Scarlet Letter.
I like trying jokes and seeing the response, and if I end up doing it in my act, it won't be 140 characters. Twitter is helpful that way to me. It's like a message in a bottle. But a lot of times I think I tweet the stuff I would like to say to teenage me.
I'm sure that I was influenced by Goldsmith's large orchestral scores when I started out, and that was because the people who employed me wanted that kind of sound. I wasn't in a position to say, 'Go to Hell!'
That's the one thing that I love about Twitter. There's no rule that says it's a discussion. So I love when I tweet something and somebody wants to have a conversation with me. I'm like, "Oh no, I don't use Twitter for conversations. I just say what I want to say so you can ask me a question but I'm not answering it."
The whole Twitter phenomenon is really indicative of what's happening in this country. And I say this in condemnation of myself as much as anyone else - we are growing into a nation that has no time, desire or capacity for truth. All we can handle is 140 characters of knowledge.
Facebook and Twitter and these other social sites bring every, I mean, 140 characters. I mean, I'm on Twitter and I have fun. But I don't think anybody learns anything about me as a person.
I'm not a Twitter fan. I do it because I feel responsible to the two million people that follow me, but Twitter to me is just another thing I have do. And it's mostly a place for people to attack and abuse you. I don't really get much out of it, personally. I get hundreds of demands to answer the kind of medical questions that require three years of treatment to assess, yet people are furious when I don't solve their problems in 140 characters. It's really stunning.
Twitter is very impulsive and impermanent and you only have 140 characters. There is no greater 'Emperor' of Twitter than Stephen Fry.
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