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Web Profits in the Gutter
The New York Times has an article about the web's one true growth industry: spam, fraud and porn. Societal meltdown or flourishing ecosystem? The talking heads debate.
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society meltdown - no matter where you go, there is someone out there that will do what you least expect for money, and that means absolutely anything.
flourishing ecosystem - having said that, this brings us to the new breed of low lives that will do anything for money, maybe an old ecology of ppl using new methods - no matter how much other ppl have to suffer for them to consider themselves 'successful'.
Unfortunately the internet is now where they breed and this is a complete abuse of the technology that was there for totally opposite reasons.
Analytic & algebraic topology of locally Euclidean meterization of infinitely differentiable Riemmanian manifold
The thing you gotta realize is that regular consumer businesses aren't too useful on the web. If I want to buy a new TV, I go down to Best Buy or something and buy one. I can trust it'll make it to my house and be in one peice. I also know that if I pay, I don't leave there without my item.
Even a lot of business to business online sites aren't too wonderful. Sure if they actually provided something useful online (such as never having to talk to a real person.. much nicer just to get online, say what you want and be done with it than trying to tell some $6/hr customer service rep exactly what it is you want)...
Web services are a joke.. unless you're talking about internal web services. Where I work we have tons of web services that are for our internal work, and they're great. But rarely do I ever find anything that's used outside of the company that does me any good.
My point? E-commerce is a fantasy, and maybe someday it can really become useful. But right now it's a novelty item, and as such only novelty shops (such as porn shops) can really make any money.
Funny because I heard on NPR a couple days ago that "e-commerce was having a great year". I guess it all depends on who you ask, and if the person you ask had a bullshit business model to start with.
I've had enough abrasive sigs. Kittens are cute and fuzzy.
In some ways, I wish the "cyberspace" notion had never been introduced, because it furthers bad analogies like these, comparing the net to a geographical neighborhood, which has apparently become a red-light district.
The reality, of course, is that the internet is a communication medium, not a neighborhood, and the apparently-proliferating number of sleazy businesses making use of it proves very little. Sure, you can make money selling fake penis-enlargement pills at a $57 markup, so long as you can find suckers (although I do admit being a bit surprised that there are so many of them).
Brewster Kahle is right on point, even if his thoughts are buried in the article:
Now if only the NY Times would stop running articles about the supposed decline of electronic "civil society," and start commentataing on the actual decline of actual civil society. Or, heaven forbid, the sleazy nature of elected officials and their corporate benefactors.
Red All Over: Rambling Missives from an Aspiring Revolutionary
Three years ago, the internet (the web in particular) was hyped into being the biggest change to society since the printing press.
Obviously most of the hype has not materialized. Although it does make some money for some people, the web has basically returned to what it was in the first place: a massive and highly efficient facilitator of information exchange. Much of this is business to business and is behind the scenes, but some of it, such as email, eclectic news sites, file sharing, and software distribution are in public view. Probably 90% of the non-computer-geeks that I know use the web for little more than email, reading news, and occasional shopping. And much of the shopping is from retailers that also have a brick-and-morter establishment.
Probably the biggest single effect of the internet is that more non-mainstream information reaches more people than ever before. This primarily non-economic use has been the major revolution brought about by the web. Although porn and spam are more prevalent than they used to be, they were always there, even before the big web hype bubble.
Furthermore, I do not even get NYT type spam at this address ("sign up for our premium content" and so forth).
Rather than idle accusations, does anyone have any proof of this accusation I hear so many peddling?
Cheers,
-- RLJ
My mistake. The "erotic stories" is unsubstantiated and rumored. Gutenberg was under heavy financial pressure and did print calendars and other popular items. Erotic stories were one of the rumored "popular" items.
As far as making sense considering the place and time? How do you figure?
The Bible was certainly controversial and dangerous. Remember, the Catholic church not only had an army, they used it. Private study of the Bible was HERESY punishable by excommunication and death -- porn was a minor offense. The Archbishop of Nassau had troops invade Maniz (sp?) looking for "Gutenberg" Bibles.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
Actually, there are more problems with an allegorical interpretation of the Song of Songs than with a more literal interpretation. The imagery is way too vivid to be construed in much of a theological context. What possible reason would God have for admiring the beloved's (which, in an allegorical interpretation, would be the reader's) body?
I would posit that a better interpretation is that the Song of Songs is simply an expression of the beauty of married love. The lover and the beloved are free to explore and, gasp, enjoy each other's bodies. Contrary to some interpretations, the Bible really does seem to teach that sex is something to be enjoyed, not endured, within a marriage. IIRC, I Corinthians 7 also deals with this.