Mailvox: a journey back in time

PH writes from 2002:

You keep mentioning “kos”. Who -or what- is this and why should anybody care?

I really love and appreciate your columns. You make reference to things and ideas very few know or have taken the time to contemplate. Referencing something as obscure as “kos” causes one to click away. Yes, I could search if I cared. If this were a book would you require the reader to put the work down and search a reference?

You cannot keep an audience that way. I’m sorry, working in television has taught me that attention is the most important commodity next to oil.

BTW: If “kos” is a “blog” you’ll find no quarter here. Blogs are portfolios without audience. If “kos” is an actual author then I’d like to see the work. If “kos” is a real Conservative without being a Republican, all the better.

I’m sorry you lost me at “kos”. If you’d mentioned “Buchanan” then you’d have had my undivided attention.

Where would we be without the lessons of television, wherein one is regaled by lectures from hairsprayed individuals with orange makeup, straight white teeth and double-digit IQs? Actually, the only lesson I’ve learned from television is not to waste my time on any non-interactive visual product that purports to be more intellectual than a sporting event.

PH’s email is useful, however, in reminding us that only a fraction of the populace pays any attention to what passes for the news, and only a fraction of that fraction – though admittedly one that has grown over the last two years – pays any attention to the blogosphere.

Not that I really need that reminder, as virtually none of my friends and family follow either my column or my blog, which is absolutely fine with me. It’s not as if I pay close attention to their little hobbies either.

One might wonder how effective the “netroots” can hope to be when someone in the television industry claims never to have heard of Kos. That’s entirely possible, of course, and yet something in PH’s language smacks of affectation.

I have to say, though, that I’m shocked at the complaint about the Kos reference. The Braddock Washington one, sure, but Kos? On an online commentary site?