So I’ve been a little vocal lately on the incestuous nature of Web 2.0 and matters pertaining to that. Mostly because 1) it’s being used and abused in San Francisco like its a drug, 2) that none of this shit matters to 90% of the population. All this despite my love for blogs and tags and Flickr and Yelp and the GYM trifecta (Yes, Microsoft, even you have some redeeming qualities). I was getting AJAX overload, as it were. Thus my harping for the last few months that I wasn’t feeling like SXSW next year — that I was done with the whole MTV-ization of Web 2.0.

Fast forward to November and I’ve magically scored myself a press pass and a hotel room from March 9th to March 14th for SXSW Interactive in Austin, TX, which is inarguably the Web 2.0 event of the season.

I think, despite my anxieties about the ever-increasing visibility of all this web stuff, it is kinda exciting in a way. I have to admit that. So some of the people aren’t all that, but there are some genuinely nice folks mixed up in all this silly business. And, well, some of the applications and services are actually kinda cool. Like Twitter and Dodgeball and Google Reader and YouTube. I’ve been depending a lot on Google Docs and Spreadsheets lately (I use it to “work from home” occasionally), for example. I guess this social networking stuff is neat in a way.

I guess in order for all this innovative technology to really move beyond our silly little insular space is to mention it to the masses in a really big way. To move beyond insider incestuousness and tell the rest of the world, “Hey, we have this neat little thing that could potentially save you tons of money and improve your quality of life.” That’s a horribly idealistic view of the world, but it’s necessary, I think. Otherwise there would be no purpose to all of this Web stuff aside from profit. Which is part of the reason I’ve been against some of this stuff recently — the obsession with profit and money is ugly stuff. I think, if I can somehow be convinced of this spirit of innovation again, I might be more optimistic.

And so, once again, I head to Austin. To renew my optimism that all of this is actually worthwhile.