Keith Holliday & The Ballad of Converge South

Quote:
Now here's a little story about a man named Keith.
A rich mayor, who laughed at bloggers with his funny teeth.
Then one day he was sitting at his home.
And out from the web came, good ol' Ed Cone.
He said Converge South is the place you want to be.
So they jumped in the Scat Bus and went to A&T


First let me disclaim I will not be at Converge South due to circumstances surrounding my job which will prevent me from going. I however send my love and warmth to all my fellow bloggers there, and I hope that if time and logistics allow, I'll be able to attend next year.

Keith Holliday & The Ballad of Converge South

This is your chance Keith Holliday. It's your chance to go down in history as the savior of the south. A chance to be remembered in this life. A chance to be somebody special, not just some random mayor lost among the folds of time & history. Your admiration, your fame lays before you. Will you seize the moment and go down as Greensboro's next Dolley Madison, or Nathaniel Greene?

The alternative is to allow your actions to be swallowed up by cultures short attention span, and to never touch your citizens lives. To merely be another political figure in some historical record of Greensboro marked by a hyphenated date range and your name. Is this how you want the world to remember the great and powerful Mayor Keith Holliday?

What will be the ironic ending to Holliday's reign? Is it a Hubris transparent to the onlooker but blinded by it's possessor? Does that fatal flaw (metaphorically speaking of course) involve blogsboro, a communications medium most mayors don't have? A mirror of truth held up to the beholder?

I'd like to clarify, because it's quite obvious to many of us "bloggers" and our supporters, exactly what your hubris is. Your downfall, the one thing that may ultimately lead to your failure, is your inability to listen and respect those citizens who have made it their point to stand up and speak for the rest.

Is blogging a joke you?

I think what I'm trying to understand is "why" you fail to acknowledge this asset in our community. What in your personality makes you treat our free speech as a petty hindrance to your larger plan? Do you rule this "Land of Oz" with the belief you don't need it's resident's opinions? Are you afraid of what you might hear? Is it that former competitors to your office have organized this blog confederacy, and you can't quite deal with the stigma? What does it take to get your attention? When can the tantrum end, and a city seperated since Woolworth's can finally find it's unification in the form of an Internet lunch counter called blogging? Should we continue the separation of the Wizard and the travellers when we "the travellers" may have done more for the city then it's own Government? Every blogger I know in Greensboro has contributed to the city because of their blog, by discussions, publicity, innovation, or corralling citizens for movement in the law making processes. Bloggers do this without payment, without thanks, and without some underlying motive. We do this because we love the area we live in, because we believe that the pen is mightier then the sword, & because we can make a difference.

This weekend, hundreds of professional and amateur journalist, along with a-list bloggers and Internet celebrities will descend upon A&T university as part of a nation-wide pilgrimage to the center of the blogosphere. Each one of these individuals will leave Greensboro, writing, communicating, and yes, blogging about the city we've given to you to care for.

It's publicity you could never afford to pay for. It's the voices you can no longer ignore, for they are growing stronger, and stronger. We are growing in numbers, and in our political power. Soon it will be the blogging community that will speak on behalf of you to your city. It's our power that will decide elections, & it may be bloggers that bring your fate.

Hubris is a funny thing and you can decide right here, right now if you want to be apart of history or merely an observer of it.