Dumbass or All-Round Education?

Written by Makke

So, what should a diskmag contain, and what shouldn't a diskmag contain? These questions rise after the little "row" in scene.flame (news.scene.org). And you wonder if the scene should be strictly THE SCENE or if some facts and topics from real life could get some space in our beloved community? It seems as if some people want the scene to be more anarchistic than it is today, and I can agree with that the scene has become more "nice" and polite than it was before. I know Hugi could be a little rougher around the edges and take a stand more "violently", but you have to think of one thing. If you want to read more rough, right on stuff write it yourselves. We don't tell you what to write and think, we only write what we think, and we like to write it in a calmer tone than others do. That we like correct-language and well written articles doesn't mean we look down on people who write more spontaneously and doesn't care about their correctness when it comes to language, but that's up to each and everyone to decide.

Ok, I'm slightly off topic here. Once again I ask, what should a diskmag contain (text-wise). Scene-stuff of course. News, reviews, interviews, tutorials and scenish debates. And this is mainly what our diskmags contain, right? So why doesn't this leave room for other stuff like political issues or food recipes? Some people do want to read about political issues and food recipes, and some do not. Political issues and food recipes are perhaps not very scenish, but without food or politics there would be no "real life" and thus no scene. However, for some the scene is a place of escape. A place where you don't want to hear anything that can be associated with real life-problems and chores. I for one would never write about politics in a diskmag. Firstly because it wouldn't do any "good", nothing would happen anyway. If you want to effect politics real life is the place for that. Secondly I wouldn't do that because I know how many childish people there are in the scene who perhaps wouldn't agree with me, and would start to send me e-mails (hiding behind fake e-mail headers) with more or less no constructive arguments at all. Even though they don't bother me much (because frankly what can they do?), it still isn't the kind of feedback I appreciate.

But should the scene be strictly scene, as some, as it seems, would like to have it? Well, at the same time as our little dispute in scene.flame was going on we were discussing books in country.sweden. Which isn't very "scenish" now is it? Of course a discussion about books wouldn't be proper in scene.flame, as this news-group is "strictly" for scene debates (and telling each other how much you suck). But still country.sweden is a place were Swedish sceners discuss scene-topics (though mostly code as it seem. Hi to the usual coders in country.sweden). However there's still room for some "off topic"-discussions.

So what's the big deal if there are a few articles that aren't THAT scene-relevant? It's not like they add an extra megabyte to the size. More like 10 kb. I mostly don't read the unscenish articles, but there might be someone who wants to read them. So why not let them stay. And I seriously doubt that you read every word in your favourite paper-magazine. There's always something you're not interested in. The only difference is that you paid for the paper-mag, and got the disk-mag for free. Don't know if there's an English "version" of the Swedish saying "Smaken „r som baken". But to translate it in a "scenish way":

"Taste is like the ass. Split."

Makke/Visuale/Hugi/Trebel

[Editor: The Germans say, "Jeder soll nach seiner Facon selig werden." Translated to English: "Everybody should become blissful in his own way." This saying comes from the Prussian king Frederick the Great. It was the motto of his reign.]