The Long Tail

“Your new blog is so boring.”

That’s what N thought about my previous blog (let’s call this Blog No. 2). Which was a fair comment as the one before that (Blog No. 1) was quite racy with posts on the groping of testicles (mine by somebody of the opposite sex) and mummified fornicators amongst other things.

I had a good time with Blog No. 1 which attracted comments which were equally raunchy. However, the bawdy comments distracted me from the real tasks at hand which were demonstrating a keen sense of observation and generating clever discussion. This led me to starting Blog No. 2 which covered heavier issues including politics and religion (though once I did spice it up with a post on Fucking*). I noticed I was attracting the attention of a different readership and was quite happy leading the discussions though they were a bit subdued.

So my answer to N should have been: “Because it’s a blog for intelligent people.” But I didn’t say that as she’s a good friend and I knew where she was coming from.

I felt very unmotivated after that as it seemed that I couldn’t please everybody. That was until I read this fantastic book called “The Long Tail” by Chris Anderson. By the way, Anderson is listed in the Time 100 (a list of the 100 men and women whose power, talent or moral example is transforming the world).

What is meant by the “Long Tail” is that in the digital age, there is no need to produce, sell or write something that would please everybody. Now any product will find its market as search engines and digital catalogues allow people to look for products which will serve their specific needs. Why this concept is called the “Long Tail” is if a demand curve is plotted for all the goods that are produced in this world there will be a short vertical tail representing goods produced for the masses but a long horizontal tail representing these niche goods.

As I read the book, I got more excited when Anderson discusses the phenomenon of blogs. He contrasts the demand for blogs to other popular media like newspapers and magazines. He argues that blogs do not have to appeal to a mass audience because bloggers could cover very specific topics like “How to rear chipmunks” and still find an audience. If this is left to the mainstream media, niche topics wouldn’t get covered. To cover their huge outlay, they would have to amass enough readership and only offer topics broad enough for mass consumption. Bloggers do not have this problem because most of us do not hope to make any money from blogging (I don’t anyway) and blogging is practically free. Oh, not to forget, Google’s Blog Search will help your audience to find you, wherever you are.

Now, do I really care if anybody says my blog is boring because I am more focused on writing about law and my life as a lawyer? I probably do, but not so much. Anyway do come back for the next post. Because it’s going to be on “10 things that sizzles your sex life but is actually against the law.”

*A small town in Austria.

The secret of my success

“I've finally figured you out,” says Mr. D over a cup of coffee at the Colonial Cup café which used to be a popular lawyers’ haunt before the courts moved to Jalan Duta.

Mr. D was formerly a litigator in my old firm before he moved to better things. He has now gone into management consulting. Even if he had started a nasi lemak stall I would have said the same.

“What have you figured out about me?” I asked, not really looking forward to his revelation.

“Well, I know you from student days and I know for a fact that you never really liked studying law as a subject. And when we meet up now and I mention any current legal issues, you never seem to add to the discussion,” Mr. D went on.

I was not sure I liked where this was heading but I was still interested to find out anyway.

“I thought that you just didn’t like to bore us with the stuff. But actually you don’t know much law, do you?”

“Excuse me?!”

“No, I mean it in a nice way. In fact it amazes me that you have got this far. You do get referred by clients and our former bosses seem to have a high regard for you.”

“Is there a compliment in there?”

“Don’t you see? Your ability to bullshit makes up for all your lack of knowledge. I’ve seen you arguing a case with just one case from a first year text book and as painful as it was, you did get the judge’s ear.”

In my mind I was agreeing with him. When I applied to law school, I really didn’t know what I was in for. Then I listened to my uncle who advised me that if you are unsure about what you want to do, just study law and it will sort itself out later. One legal career later, I’m still unsure whether this is for me. I do churn out case winning submissions every now and then but I’m not sure whether it’s due to real legal knowledge or just the ability to mash-up half a dozen obscure legal propositions (researched by my assistants) and fashion them to win my arguments. I suspect that most of the time I seem more impressive than other Malay lawyers just because I could string sentences in English without any obvious grammatical errors.

“So you are saying that my most redeeming feature is that I can bluff my way through legal practice?”

“Yeah. And I promise I won’t tell your clients.”

I’d better pick up the tab for the coffee then.