Fish Story
By Michael Swaine
First fishcams, and now fish food. What's this fascination with fish? As people wander by your site, hold out a basket of goodies to tempt them, David Siegel suggests in his book, Creating Killer Web Sites. Gossip, news, sports scoresıthis is what I call "fish food."
This fish-food metaphor strikes me as, well, fishy.
I mean, think about it: You scatter the flakes on the surface of the water, and then what? What exactly can you hope to get back from the fish in return for this act of generosity, or at least gratuitousness?
So far as I can tell, you get to count the fish.
And you do that, don't you? Numberless Web sites proudly announce that I am the 346,792th fish to swim into their bowl.
There has just got be more to fish food than hit counting.
Realizing that you were counting on me to explicate the deep hidden meaning of the fish-food metaphor, I recently took myself off to a rustic spa in northern Oregon, there to meditate, commune with nature, and flex my cranial muscle over this fish fetish. At first I thought it must be some sort of Christian symbolism, like bread on the water, only smaller and with a higher protein content. Later, during the sacred sweat-lodge ritual, I began to wonder if this was just one of those things that only fish fanciers can understand.
Theology and fish lore being equally closed books to my earthbound intelligence, I rejected both theories. The only way to get to the bottom of this fishy business, I realized, was to be the fish.
