Date: Wed, 1 Dec 1999 11:21:25 GMT
From: "Soc Microlab2, UEA" <A.Rousso@uea.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: memetics-digest V1 #95
To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
well, Mr Lavelle has obviously taken too many psychotropic
substances, but his rant did bring to mind a conspiracy
theory of my own.
Imagine his ranting was a trojan horse (a meme that seems to
benefit its receiver which actually contains something more
detrimental within). We are already at a stage where we
can't be bothered to parse all the crap we get e-mailed -
and we recognise rubbish like Mr Lavelle's pretty quickly.
But - all of us read it!
e-mail is still one of the best media for getting directly
into people's minds (or their attention spans). If you've
got a contagious yet dangerous idea you want to promulgate,
all you have to do is pretend to be a stark raving lunatic,
coming up with another apocalyptic conspiracy or whatever,
and everyone will be simply gagging to read your theory to
have a laugh. Hey presto - meme transfer.
I think I'll be off to pick some strange mushrooms . . .
cheers, alex.
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