We live in public

Please watch this documentary. I can not stress how crazy and weird and interesting and sad and unbelievable this documentary is. 'We Live in Public' (by Ondi Timoner) follows an internet pioneer Josh Harris back in the early days of the internet and his exploits.

© Ondi Timinor

My opinions and thoughts on Harris became so polarized as the film unraveled more and more of the eccentric mogul's story. Was he a genius, or was he a fool? Was he ahead of his time, or was he out of touch with reality? Was he an artistic visionary, or was he just plain crazy? By the end of the documentary, I really felt he was all of these things.  

© Ondi Timoner

The documentary, and Josh's views, were themed on the loss of privacy with the coming of the internet, and how he could take the idea to its extremes.  Sound familiar? well, Josh saw it coming over a half decade ahead of birth of facebook or youtube.  How he explores the concept is through a off-beat, wild, and utterly insane social experiment that I won't ruin for you in this post.

The key to the documentary to me personally was that it left me with the feeling of "you had to be there" with equal parts "trust me, you didn't want to be there".  It made me feel sympathetic and repulsed by Josh, and was fascinating the full way through.