The Wiki Man: Tailor-made television

I could paint a Mona Lisa,
I could be another Caesar;
Compose an oratorio that is sublime.
The door’s not shut on my genius – but
I just don’t have the time.






Like Flanders & Swann’s sloth, many people are secretly convinced that they could write a masterpiece. Almost everyone also believes that they could start an internet business — if they only had the time.

I once considered starting a micro-swearing network called Touretter — an angrier version of Twitter. And a group of us recently debated starting Farmville: The European Union Edition. This was to be an online farming game where you own a tract of virtual land and then receive huge sums of imaginary money for doing absolutely nothing. Once or twice a year, you would fill in Form 407B205b, after which you’d receive a virtual cheque from Brussels with which you could add a new Jacuzzi to your virtual farmhouse. In the end, we decided that it was too depressingly realistic.