If Nerds Ran The World
Just before I left Tel Aviv, at the Dizengoff mall, I saw one thing which gave me hope: a dozen young men, many of whom were dressed in soldier's uniforms sitting at some tables, playing what appeared to be Magic: The Gathering
Now, I know absolutely nothing about the game. I had a roommate in college who apparently was a big fan. He had two long boxes of cards, but I never once saw him play. He kept claiming he had special, "rare" Magic cards that were worth big money, to which I said,"Yeah? So why don't you sell them?" But he never did. See, that's the core of nerd-dom, to value that which outside of a select group is pretty much worthless.
But why does this give me hope? Because as we well know, nerds aren't fighters. They may play the games of warriors, but when it comes down to it, a nerd would rather reason through your differences, than kill you over them. Nerds do fight, but they fight over details.
And so, it came to me to consider what that alternative reality would be like if "nerds" were the mainstream, and the "non-nerds" on the periphery.
Thus, I give you...
Top Ten Ways Life Would Be Different if Nerds Ran The World...
My Friendster Network Owns You
Name Dropping
A while back, I came across the newest sensation in online time-suckage: the social-network, ala Friendster. I signed up some months ago, but found few actual friends on the system. Using the search, I discovered a guy in Chicago who shared my name, and then for fun, sent connection requests to some "celebs" I only casually knew. Imagine my surprise when I logged in a couple of weeks later and saw that my Friendster network was now over 300,000 strong, and included actual semi-famous-type comedians.
Comedians, particularly of the alterna-set, tend towards the nerd spectrum, and thus are early adopters of such innovations as CD-players, computers, video games and D&D 3rd Edition. Take Chris Hardwick, of MTV "Singled Out" and syndicated "Shipmates" hosting gigs. He lists his favorite music as:
"Radiohead, Neil Finn, Elvis Costello, Grant Lee Phillips,Cousin Lovers, The Sundays, World Party, Zeppelin, Glen Campbell, Nirvana, Weird Al, there's obviously not enough room to give you a valid representation of my musical taste. don't fucking judge me"
Can we say, nerdy, boys and girls?And not to forget Wil Wheaton who, thanks to his funny and insightful Weblog, remade his image into an Internet nerd rockstar.