"The Wiki Man" lyrics - THE TANGENT

[I) Prologue]

[II) The Wiki Man]

All of our answers are here prepared in real time
In cities of servers and disks across the globe
In whatever format is the fashion
In whatever language is the mode
And all of our memories jump from the Ether
At the click of a mouse or a tap on the screen
A Gig in New York or some kids' wedding
All jostling around the grander scheme

But if I dared to question
All the congestion
Of infomedial chatter in my home
I'd be nothing!

Out of a novel from the fifties
Comes this mad nightmare, our "Childhood's End"
It gives me all that I have but leaves me half empty
With a full glass of 2000 electronic "friends"

But if I lived without it, do not doubt it
I'd be cutting off my nose to spite my screen
And I'd be Nothing, no Nothing!
Have I become the Wiki Man?

If I lived without it, just think about it
I'm living a dream in the Ether not much more
I am nothing! - Just a hopeful has been
Nothing! - An aging prog queen
Getting his kicjs while he still can
Nothing! - Am I just lines of data?
Nothing! - Or in reserve for later?
Have I become the Wiki Man?

[III) Competition Watershed]

[IV) Edit You Out]

So take some music or take a play
Some poetry you didn't write or a quote you didn't say
And write biographies of people you don't know
YOUR matter-of-opinion is the main point of the show
In these strange days

But today I had a brief talk to a man I did not know
From a place I've ever heard in a language I forgot
Written in Cyrullic, so couldn't see the words
Yet with a click I understood him
Though his voice, I never heard
In these strange days
But YOU, you can edit that out...
... of this story
But YOU, you can edit me out
Yes YOU, really you, can edit me out

Leave the house a hero and come home as a scourge
They can edit up your profile with a simple flaming urge
Level your ambition with Laetotes and bile
You're open to opinion and they'll never close the file
In these strange days

Everyone's a journalist (that's when they're not a star)
And those who aint celebrities like to diss the ones that are
The writing's on the Facebook walls, it's a spattered on the blogs
On a billion whirling hard disks, those modern squealing cogs
Of these strange days

So now we're all encyclopedia correspondents
We're all record companies
We're all world famous rock bands

And we're running the biggest car boot sale
In the history of The Universe

[V) Car Boot Sale]

[VI) Wiki Man Reprise]