Shannon Phillips

So, I’m pretty pleased with myself for getting this here blog set up. It was the work of a few hours, and involved: getting a shell account on my ISP’s server; using my very basic knowledge of the Linux command line to download and install WordPress in the right directory on the remote server; creating and configuring a MySQL database for the blog; and futzing with CSS to make it look the way I want. My programmer friends will be rolling their eyes now, but I think I stand a pretty good chance of impressing my mom. Hi mom!

I guess the reason I’m so proud is that, while everything I did is really basic on a Morlock level, it’s probably impossible on the Eloi level, and I like reminding myself that I can be a Morlock when I want to. The Morlock/Eloi metaphor, by the way, comes from Neal Stephenson’s “In the Beginning Was the Command Line”:

Contemporary culture is a two-tiered system, like the Morlocks and the Eloi in H.G. Wells’s The Time Machine, except that it’s been turned upside down. In The Time Machine the Eloi were an effete upper class, supported by lots of subterranean Morlocks who kept the technological wheels turning. But in our world it’s the other way round. The Morlocks are in the minority, and they are running the show, because they understand how everything works.”

It’s probably worth mentioning that there’s a cadre of helpful Morlocks willing to install WordPress on behalf of any Eloi who wants a blog but is intimidated by the installation process.