The video version of Texting S3E5, in which Tomek and I review the documentary Mark Lombardi: Death-Defying Acts of Art and Conspiracy, was posted about a week ago and now has over 2.4K views. That’s a lot for us, and we’re not sure why the upload has generated so much traffic, although it seems that despite a rather high number of likes and some new subs to my YouTube channel at least some of the attention the video has received is the result of hate-watching. A naysayer named chuckmacnorris9613, for example, commented as follows:
Don’t watch.
It’s all, ahhh, ummmm, you know, and dead air.
It’s just two creeps on a Skype call.
Now, apart from the fact that Tomek and I use Riverside rather than Skype to record our little pod, we found this facetious description of our efforts endearing. In fact, I had hoped to express my appreciation for Mr. MacNorris’ clever turn of phrase and then explain to him that “ahh, ummmm, you know, and dead air” is what it sometimes sounds like when reflective and discerning individuals engage deeply with a text and try to express themselves as precisely as possible, but his comment mysteriously disappeared before I had the chance. Of course, I as moderator of the comments absolutely did not delete the Chuckster’s negative review, but it’s possible he himself did after my co-host replied to it in his characteristically playful, self-deprecating manner:
In any case, textual deviants, we hope you will watch the video for yourselves and make up your own minds about it. All we ever aim to do is enrich your understanding and appreciation of the text in question. Did we succeed this time around?
P.S. The people have spoken, and it looks like the next text will be the Emerald Tablet. Stay tuned.