WEEKLY WHINE

Quarterly review

Is GoobNet meeting its objectives?

Well, to answer that question, first we will have to figure out what our objectives are.

Certainly our Five Thrusts of knowledge, support, novelty, community, and variety are some of the things we should be delivering to you. But it's not enough just to provide things that make you smart, give you support, offer new experiences, bring you together, and differentiate themselves.

After all, remember that we have one node [GoobNet Football] devoted entirely to a single sport, and one node [Commitment to Space] devoted entirely to a single Universe. This strongly suggests that there are particular topics about which we want to provide things that make you smart, give you support, offer new experiences, bring you together, and differentiate themselves. These topics, obviously, are space, football, and space again.

Weekly Whines by topic

	Sport	109
	Space	66
	Computers	33
	Propaganda	24
	Politics	23
	Mathematics	16
	Random	122

Remember, this doesn't sum to the total number of Weekly Whines, as some of them were placed into two topics. Note the difference from when this information was last tabulated. Sport has easily overtaken space for first place, whereas mathematics has lagged behind considerably. It may be worthwhile to tabulate football separately from other sports, but we don't feel like doing that.

Weekly Whines by category

	Knowledge	28
	Space	09
	Sport	08
	Mathematics	04
	Support	54
	GoobNet SPEED	27
	Mixed Up Horoscopes	10
	Novelty	87
	Interaction	40
	Schmilblick Patrol	11
	Focal Plane	16
	Community	66
	GoobNet Mailbox	30
	Dynamite Eating Edvard	20
	Variety	77
	Space	12
	Sport	31
	News	15
	[none]	59

Each category includes its subcategories, so that, for example, the Community category includes thirty GoobNet Mailbox Whines, twenty Edvard Whines, and sixteen generic Community Whines.

Why has knowledge failed us so? Is it because there is a shortage of knowledge? Absolutely not. Is it because GoobNet staffers personally lack knowledge? Well, yes, in certain cases. Is it because knowledge is boring? Yes, that must be it.

But Whines that were included under Novelty and Variety frequently incorporate knowledge, do they not? In certain cases, this is true. But one should not rely on the GoobNet Focal Plane for all one's knowledge, just as one should not rely on The Daily Show for all one's news.

We have learned that GoobNet excels at novelty and variety, but that knowledge is sorely lacking, just as in the White House.