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Web No Longer Eclectic?
khog writes: "The Sunday New York Times had a front-page article entitled, "Exploration of World Wide Web Tilts From Eclectic to Mundane." The article says that "[t]he Web was supposed to subvert corporate domination of culture by giving a global soapbox -- or printing press, or television station -- to anyone with a computer and a modem" and takes off from there. Was the Web ever "supposed to be" anything, much less a subversion of "corporate domination of culture?" Isn't the reduction of idle surfing and the increase of a "more direct, predetermined approach to the Web" just a "reflection" of an educated user base that knows what it wants?"
Geez, someone needs to tell these guys about blogs. A few quick trips to Memepool and BoingBoing should be enough to convince anyone that the web is still a pretty eclectic and loony place to be.
Yes, and apparently the public wants the same kind of packaged, spoon-fed crap that we're already getting on the teevee. What a surprise.
The difference between theory and practice is that, in theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
When I first started using the web, I followed almost every link I saw, used several bad search engines, and got nowhere. I'll admit that I found sites that I never would have otherwise found, but the waste of time getting there just wasn't worth it.
I think after the excitement of the web died down a bit, everyone realized how to use it, and now uses it much more efficiently. They don't go all over the place randomly; they go straight to what they want. If you are a new user to the web it still feels exciting and new. Sadly, most people aren't new users which isn't such a bad thing really.
The great thing about Google and Open Directory is that you can usually find what you want without pain.
I don't see how any of this undercuts the personal-freedom aspect of the web. A lot of the starred "cool" sites that Open Directory steers you to are personal sites.
Find free books.
Did we expect that as the mainstream world came online it would totally follow the patterns of the early adopters? The net can't be mainstream without meeting the mainstream world at least half way.
/., which in turn point them off to potentially interesting tidbits.
Indeed, perhaps we should be more surprised at how much the non-mainstream web has incolcated itself into everyday life, up from 0.001% a decade ago. That's more amazing than the fact that novelty wears off.
If it has -- the studies reported more time spent online, and more time spent at the major sites. That can still mean an increase, if not as great, at the non-mainstream sites. And many people spend time at "popular" sites like
We should never have expected the ordinary world to be come or remain fascinated with everything that can be published on the web. Sturgeon's law still applies (even if, as my corollary suggests, that 90% of Sturgeon's law is crap.)
Has it been over a year since you last donated to the Electronic Frontier Foundation
the article talks about a guy who used to go to all these different sites and read various things about people, their online diaries, read news stories, etc. Now this guy simply checks stock quotes and other tidbits. The web has simply gotten boring. People find other things to do in life and they typically wont include the internet, hence the only thing people to out there is check email, read the news, and of course, read /.
The One Rule Of Chess You'll Ever Need: Don't play someone who carries a kit in their bookbag.
"[t]he Web was supposed to subvert corporate domination of culture by giving a global soapbox -- or printing press, or television station -- to anyone with a computer and a modem" and takes off from there. Was the Web ever "supposed to be" anything, much less a subversion of "corporate domination of culture?"
Yes, I think that is how it was. Just look at the millions and millions of personal homepages, corporate and organization websites, blogs and everything you can think of. This is how it is, and I think that whether it was supposed to be this way or not, I can only see how this is good.
"Isn't the reduction of idle surfing and the increase of a "more direct, predetermined approach to the Web" just a "reflection" of an educated user base that knows what it wants?"
Yes, I believe that is true, but I think that it is not only a reflection of a user that knows what he/she wants and also knows how to get it. Perhaps people aren't that fascinated by surfing around randomly anymore, and they go to the websites they see being presented in the media. It is easier to go there directly than to search around only to grow tired of it.
Will work for bandwidth
I second the comments about blogs, and importantly (and tied very much to blogs) XML-RPC. A new layer that is going to blast the shit out of all of what we have now. Almost everything is stagnating because what we see as the internet right now is either proprietary technologies which never expand, or the text web that is growing crustier every day.
We outgrew HTML years ago, and even though it's just fine for doling out what you need right now. XML-RPC makes networking so inherently easy that there is no longer any reason not to have a networked program where it could be networked.
The annoying thing is all the dumbasses on wallstreet (and yes, I own stocks, and I know what I'm talking about) dumping volumes of cash into the wrong technologies. Thankfully that means the cool new technologies are growing slowly and realize what they need to survive.
That way you won't just see XML-RPC one day and say "nifty, too bad it doesn't do X", you'll slowly see it migrate into everything you do, and it will already be capable of almost all the things you want.
Enough ranting, checkout http://scripting.com and http://www.xml-rpc.com for daily updates on it's sucess.
Non-reg link: http://archive.nytimes.com/2001/08/26/technology/2 6ONLI.html
I think this article is more a reflection of what's wrong with mainstream journalism these days.
Journalists defined the web as being designed to subvert corporate media, to give anyone a voice, to put them out of business. Is that really what developers had at NCSA had in mind? Is there a mainstream journalist who cares to research the facts in this or most other matters when there are commonly repeated mantras about what something is or is about? And then a few months later they get to write an article like this one, making their subject out to be a failure at obtaining the goals which they themselves invented.
Perhaps in something like this, reporting on the web, it doesn't really matter. But once you realize the level of ethics and research most journalists apply in reporting important happenings foreign and domestic, and that most americans do not seek out alternative sources of information.. It is rather scarey.
When the television was first invented, people would turn it on just to see the snow, if their was no singal to pick up. Just using the technology was a thrill in itself.
I think the web was the same way. When people first got access to it, it was fun to investigate the web page that had pictures of all one hundred My Little Pony's, just because clicking was fun, and also just to see whether or not something that specialized really existed.
Of course, when novelty dies down, people are going to use things for what they need, not just to see "if they can".
Hopefully I didn't put any [] around my words.
As many people have said by now, when we first discovered the web we "surfed", visiting hundreds of pages and different ones every time. Now, we (at least me) stick with a fairly static collection of regularly updated pages.
The web has finally become a tool iunstead of a novelty, one that is not seen as interesting by itself any more because it's been around for too long. Surfing around for eclectic content has become the online equivalent of calling random strangers to try out your amazing new telephone.
People keep saying "The Internet is supposed to be..." and then they fill in the blank with whatever they think most benefits them, and then whine when it turns out to be nothing more or less than a de-centralized network of networks instead of whatever miracle machine to which they personally feel somehow divinely entitled.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Part of the issue here is just how rapidly people's perceptions change. Just look at some of the sites that already exist; slashdot is actually a pretty good example. A place like this never could have existed under the old system of publishing. But people have adapted so rapidly to the concept of places like slashdot that they stop seeing them as the radical change to the old order that they are. The failure of the web to live up to its promise only shows that some of its promise was a mirage. It turns out that giving everyone a virtual soapbox doesn't equate to them all having worthwhile things to say or audiences ready to listen.
There's no point in questioning authority if you aren't going to listen to the answers.
The Internet promised to be the next generation platform for pornography and piracy. I can remember back in the mid-80s being able to download porn images (er...I mean a good friend told me they remember...). The Internet certainly has delivered on these promises.
I'd love to see a breakdown of total Internet bandwidth allocated to porn and piracy. I'd bet it consumes >90% of the total bandwidth used. Movies, music, and babes...now, if only they could figure out a way to download alcohol and drugs.
--Be human.
Sure it was. When I first saw the web, it was supposed to be a way to hyperlink citations in physics papers.
I still have that browser somewhere on one of my NeXT machines. It's hard-wired to look for its start page at a machine at CERN that doesn't exist anymore, though.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
This is such old news. Of course people go to a few favorite sites! They have done so ever since bookmarks were invented. The fact that people don't "surf" as randomly as before is just an indication that they know what to look for.
sulli
RTFJ.
I wish I had an international outlet for my pointless ramblings and sensationalism. This times article embodies the reasons that I hate mainstream news. 'Dear public, let me ask you a question that you only care about because, with my years of writing experience, I can make tying your shoes sound like a life altering experience. I'll pontificate for awhile, have you hanging on my every word, and when I'm done you'll have gained absolutely nothing because the entire subject is based on personal opinions; a vapor trail that leads to my fucking wallet.' These 'journalists' can take the dramatic overlay and shove it. They need to watch the 'Bart's People' episode of the Simpsons 5 times every morning before they go to work.
I've been a member of Everything2 since the days of Everything1. I have yet to find a more eclectic community there. E2 is the type of site that lets you just get lost in all the content, while allowing one-click transitions from the historical to the fantastic. While the editors weed out any nodes detrimental to the database, it is an example of how the world can create an enormous self-managed site.
For more information, click here.
For a little geek to be ranting at their keyboard, and for a megacorp to quote that as some sort of authoritive source within 24 hours seems subversive to traditional media outlets, at the very least.
I can't describe how much that speed of it happening restored my faith in the 'net.
Now, if I could only go and write a well thought-out piece with something to say, that would be even better.
...j
it's free, right? then why not just display the friggin thing for all to see?
I guess they want to get something out of it, and a basic idea of who their customers are is something. My philosophy is, if I were to subscribe to them I'd have to give them my name and address, plus some money. This way I get the same thing, without having to spend money.
nytimes isn't worth the effort to sign up for an account. they think they can afford to piss off people? i hope they go bankruptcy
I really hope they don't; if they did that would mean the parent company, and the print edition would go out of business as well. And the New York Times, whatever it's faults, is still the best paper in the world.
I've been working with it since early nineties, and my older son began to read on screen before than on paper.
He's now 13. A quote from him, six months ago:
"Internet is no longer carried out by intelligent people. Now it looks too much like TV".
'nuff said.
Sarcasm aside, the article describes an alteration in usage patterns which suggests users are actually going ot the web with purpose and intent to achieve specific goals. The same conclusion is reached in the narative in the beginning of the article.USers no longer drift from site to site just to see what's there, but instead, target their activity to the specific sites that (through advertising and other marketing efforts of the content owners) they know to contain the information they're looking for. This does not signify a loss to the web, bur rather, an evolution in web usage, and a recognition by users of the real economic falue of the web as a business and academic tool. This should be recognized as a vary positive step for the web.
--CTH
--Got Lists? | Top 95 Star Wars Line
The internet was a small, subversive group when it started and hence its reputation as being a completely free society. Now that there are a billion AOL subscribers surfing the web there seems to be a great lament that internet has "gone mainstream." Not surprisingly these protests tend to come from the billion AOL users looking for granny pr0n.
I think the subversives remain and the shutdown of a "wanna-be" site like Napster doesn't particularly change a thing. When rebellion becomes mainstream the rebels simply dig themselves deeper.
There is all sort of old-school internet content out there if you're willing to dip your toes in the churning waters outside Yahoo...
Nah, the web's still pretty damn electric. Whaddya think all those routers and servers run on, little hamsters or Flintstone style birds looking into the camera and going 'it's a living'?
Oh... nevermind.
SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
The web was invented as a research tool that piggybacked off the Internet. Period. Everything else has been a matter of people projecting their own wants and desires onto what they _think_ they see in the web.
Music traders see it as a place to get MP3 files.
Gamers see it as a place to meet other gamers and play online.
Marketers see it as a tool to drive more personalized sales.
Pr0n hounds see it as a place to get lots of free pr0n.
Geeks see it as a community of fellow-travellers, as do other people too.
And so on...
You know what? They're all right - and so are the people not listed here. The important point to all this (and implied by my saying they're all correct) is that the Internet is what you need/want it to be. Period. More people now are using the Internet as a Place To Get Stuff Done, as opposed to a Cool New Thing. So there's less random wandering, and a lot more travel to destination sites. It's where you Get Stuff Done. There's still a lot of cool, random, and strange stuff out there if you either know where to look, or feel like taking the time to look. But fewer people want to do that nowadays - heck, I don't want to do that as much nowadays - even though when I do wander, having high-speed connections at home and work makes it a lot more fun than it was back in the 33.6 dialup days.
The soapboxes are still out there, but just like in reality (you know, the big room with blue ceilings - where you can't readily see the walls), people ignore the folks who shout on the street corners in cyberspace, too.
-- Josh Turiel
"2. Do not eat iPod Shuffle."
Well yeah, cathode ray tubes are like that. :-)
--hongpong.com
Is there really less idle surfing, or just a smaller PERCENTAGE of idle surfing?
The web has ten times as many users as it did a few years ago, and it has a lot more established places to go. Idle surfing is no longer the ONLY thing to do, and idle surfers are no longer the only web users.
So this doesn't mean there are fewer clicks and eyeballs wandering around looking at people's cat pictures, but twice as many of them would still be a smaller percentage of a larger user base surfing a larger web...
Rob
"The internet was designed so that, in time of nuclear war, the US Military would have uninterrupted access to pornography"
dave
--Got Lists? | Top 95 Star Wars Line
Please don't take my comments personally. They aren't meant to be. The reasons I feel the way I do about AOL is:
The commercials that scream "EASY!" over and over, all the time using sound bites from people talking about how they do this and do that on AOL (travel, news, stocks, weather), as if this is some big deal, when all this is available on the Net in much greater quantity.
The fact that AOL charges so much more per month than ISPs do.
The fact that their software isn't standards-compliant. Why can't they allow their e-mail client to use POP3/IMAP or at least give people the option to use these protocols if they want to use their own client software?
The issue of standards slapped me in the face just last week. I was rebuilding a machine after a SirCam attack, and the gentleman was using AOL. So I reinstalled AOL 6.0 and got everything working. He then tried to post to a mailing list he subscribes to, but his posts kept being rejected. After doing some detective work, I came to the conclusion that the list didn't like HTML formatting in the messages. No problem, I'd just switch his mail to plain text, and he should be OK. After about 20 minutes of poking around the AOL software, I couldn't find a way to do this, so I called tech support. The tech I spoke to had me check several settings, to no avail. When we were both stumped, I mentioned that this was AOL 6.0 (I assumed she'd figure that's what was running), at which point she said that that was the reason: AOL 6.0 doesn't allow you to send plain text e-mail. She said you could switch from HTML to plain text in earlier versions, but this was dropped in 6.0. Why??? Why take away functionality??? That's just stupid! Fortunately, he had another e-mail account that wasn't on AOL, so I set him up to use that, but that wouldn't have been necessary if AOL hadn't pulled this boneheaded move.
I do agree that there are reasons one might want to use AOL, but why do they have to have a service that dumbs things down so much? It would be so easy to have something that would allow users to grow as they increased their skills. CompuServe managed to do this back in the old days. Why can't AOL do it now?
That light you see at the end of the tunnel might be from an oncoming train.