The Talmud as a Template for Digital Publishing

Alte is Neue Again

The Jewish Canon

Torah

Tanach

Mishnah

Gemorah

Rashi

Tosafot

Maimonides

Kabbalah, Hasidut, Musar

Modern Jewish Literature

The Jewish Canon-Reasons

Torah-The Be All and End All

Tanach—Prophets and Writings

Mishnah—The Oral Law

Gemorah—Explication on the Mishnah

Rashi—Commentary on Mishnah and Gemorah

Tosafot—Followers of Rashi

Maimonides-Dealing with the Renaissance

Kabbalah, Hasidut, Musar-Dealing with Emancipation

Modern Jewish Literature-Dealing with Modernity

The Talmud

The Talmud

Kilayim Chapter 7, Mishnah 3

The following are forbidden, but they do not prohibit:

The remainder of a karahat of a vineyard.The remainder of a mehol of a vineyard.The remainder of an aris-gap.The remainder of papyrus-ropes. But beneath a vine, and within the place left

to work a vine, and the four cubits of a vineyard, these do prohibit.

www.digg.com

Digg.com vs. Talmud

The Problem with Digg.com: Ron Paul

Mob: Wisdom or Tyranny• I stopped reading digg because I was sick and tired of finding out

what Ron Paul had for lunch that day. I was also annoyed when my reasonable comments (”Is there any evidence that, as RonPaulFan2008 says, ‘the Federal Reserve is a sinister conspiratorial cabal?’ I’d really like to see the proof.”) were buried under a raft of thumbs-down votes.

• Digg seems almost completely void of humanity - filled with gutter-snipe misogyny, fringe politics, and the crassest kinds of juvenile behavior.

• All these sites start with a nucleus of dedicated people. Then as the gawkers join in you see a dilution. People who were there originally feel alienated and feel that the thing they helped created is being perverted…it’s the wisdom of the crowds or the tyranny of the mob. You never know what you’re going to get.

The Ron Paul Problem

• Too easy to game.

• Time commitment of commenters.

• Overload of information vs. too narrow a filter.

Result: Value of information declines.

www.instapundit.com

Instapundit Structure

• One editor (rabbi)

• No comments

• Broadcasting model

Fundamental Problem: One filter leads to bias and one person’s overstretched schedule.

www.boingboing.com

Structure and Flaws of boingboing.net

• Cabal of hip editors (rabbis) finding hip things

• Not much community interface

• The good: ultrahip

• The bad: ultrahip

• Boingboing works very well for a specific target niche, but not for everyone.

Talmud Versus News Sites

Other Online Models

• Wikipedia• Knol• Facebook/MySpace• Search Engines• Scientometrics• Flickr

• They all face the same fundamental challenge: creating value from free, digital content.

About Sam Jaffe

• Fifteen years in magazine journalism.• On staff at SmartMoney, Bloomberg,

BusinessWeek, The Scientist• Freelance for Scientific American, Popular

Science, Wired among others• Book on Torah and business to be published by

Amacom in November, co-written with Rabbi Levi Brackman.

• Evergreen, CO• sjaffe@samjaffe.com