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The Cure for Information Overload

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the technological-success-story dept.

Ged writes "Those librarian blogerati have done it again: they've just discovered 'The Cure for Information Overload'. It's a very elegant formula if you ask me, with obvious SRU/SRW applications, and maybe even TLA ramifications. I'm not sure about all of the conclusions, but it sure is an interesting theory."

94 comments

  1. Yay for Ponies!!! by Toast10101 · · Score: 5, Informative

    OMG!!! An informative and interesting first post!!!

    The informative and interesting part: Ponies are little horsies.

    1. Re:Yay for Ponies!!! by B3ryllium · · Score: 1

      NOTICE - This Is Miniature Horse Territory

    2. Re:Yay for Ponies!!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      oh gawd...thanks for sharing....ugh, like too much inFORmation...gawd

  2. Escape! by tehshen · · Score: 3, Funny

    If you're suffering from information overload, the last place you want to be is here.

    Soooo many stories...

    --
    Guy asked me for a quarter for a cup of coffee. So I bit him.
    1. Re:Escape! by Andrzej+Sawicki · · Score: 1

      At least they are short. Finally something adequate to my late-night attention span. :)

    2. Re:Escape! by JamesTRexx · · Score: 1

      Looks like many are already avoiding this place. The number of comments with each story posted today is dropping.

      --
      home
    3. Re:Escape! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny
      Soooo many stories...

      So little time each year!

      It's like the superbowl for, err, australians: WTF is going on!? I thought you said football. This is so wrong and backward.

    4. Re:Escape! by tabby · · Score: 1

      nah there is like 5 stories. The rest are dupes.

      --
      I've experiments to run, there is research to be done on the people who are still alive.
  3. Recursive by The+Lerneaen+Hydra · · Score: 0, Redundant

    Link, points to link, points to link, points to link, points to ad, or wait, there was a link there, points to link... ad infinitum. And this was supposed to help information overload how???? I didn't even see any pink ponies!! I want them!

    1. Re:Recursive by Bricklets · · Score: 2, Informative

      yeah! i got the ad and i *thought* i had hit the end. nope, there was a link at the bottom...

      i'm still clicking as we speak

      --
      Little Bricklets
    2. Re:Recursive by mrwonton · · Score: 1

      It sounds like you've been CURED!!

      --
      Not more than you need, just more than you want
    3. Re:Recursive by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      http://the-library-and-i.blogspot.com/2006/04/tmi. html

      And then you start over and over again... nice joke I must say. This is a new type of Slashdotting Google's Servers?

  4. GAH!!! by deopmix · · Score: 4, Funny

    I just want to read the article, it seems to keep linking to other links. I think that it's broken. Anybody got any suggestions??

    1. Re:GAH!!! by kshade · · Score: 1

      OMG! It's even circular!

    2. Re:GAH!!! by deopmix · · Score: 1

      Nevermind, i found the solution. Apparently it's outlook 2002 http://www.microsoft.com/office/previous/xp/column s/column01.asp

    3. Re:GAH!!! by this+great+guy · · Score: 1

      Hahaha :) Blondes are going to click-and-click-and-click... ad infinitum without ever realizing it :)

    4. Re:GAH!!! by frovingslosh · · Score: 1

      Right click on the link. Select "Follow links until final article is reached" from the pop-up menu. Note: this feature may not be available in all browsers, including IE.

      --
      I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
    5. Re:GAH!!! by ch424 · · Score: 1

      It seems to get to here, then starts looping.

      There's ten minutes I'll never get back.

    6. Re:GAH!!! by Alef · · Score: 1

      It is sort of an inverted DDOS...

  5. Dupe! by electronerdz · · Score: 1, Insightful

    They are all dupes!

    --
    Kernel Krunch - Part of a Complete OS
  6. Typical by Big+Frank · · Score: 5, Funny

    Another poorly written Slash Dot summary. The article has a completely different perspective.

  7. The cure by Xymor · · Score: 5, Funny

    The cure for information overload has been found centuries ago. It's called Beer.

    1. Re:The cure by zpeterz63 · · Score: 1

      Beer--the cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems.

      -Homer Simpson

  8. Wait a minute... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    But... but... What about the kitties?

    1. Re:Wait a minute... by heisencat · · Score: 1

      Never mind the kitties, where are the PONIES???!?!??!?1!

      --
      We only want a quiet place to finish working while God eats our brains.
      --Bruce Sterling
  9. Chuck Norris Fact by tehlinux · · Score: 4, Funny

    Chuck Norrris' tears cure information overload. It's too bad he has never cried!

    --
    Most linux users don't know this, but the man pages were named after Chuck Norris. Chuck Norris fsck'ing hates noobs!
  10. The interesting questions are: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Has anyone counted the number of links present now (no loops found yet) -- and does anyone know what comes _after_ slashdot?

  11. the end by rippofrank · · Score: 0

    i will reach the end of the links, i bet there are ponies there :-)

    1. Re:the end by rippofrank · · Score: 1, Funny

      the link goes to machine readable then philospher librarian and then loops back to philosopher librarian.

  12. I'm happy to help by RedLaggedTeut · · Score: 4, Funny

    I just want to read the article, it seems to keep linking to other links. I think that it's broken. Anybody got any suggestions??

    Sure, here is a working link: http://tinyurl.com/ng69u
    --
    I'm still trying to figure out what people mean by 'social skills' here.
    1. Re:I'm happy to help by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Just keep following the links,
      the number of new sites that adblock
      can learn about is worth the effort...

    2. Re:I'm happy to help by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Quite insightful, but a terrible fucking hiku.

  13. Straight? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Who the hell are the people tagging it straight?!

    Petty homo's on /.

    1. Re:Straight? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Who the hell are the petty homophobes tagging everything gay?

  14. Enough with the April Fool's Crap by ThresholdRPG · · Score: 0, Troll

    How about for next year's April Fool's joke, you just run the site normally.

    Are you idiots aware yet that this is not funny any more (if it ever was).

    Do you really think telling the same joke over and over makes it funny?

    --

    -Michael
    Threshold RPG
    1. Re:Enough with the April Fool's Crap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's still funny. Please go away.

    2. Re:Enough with the April Fool's Crap by JrbM689 · · Score: 0

      Ok. Next year we will run the site normally, free of any and all humor. LOL JUST KIDDING !! HAPPY APRIL FOOLS DAY!

    3. Re:Enough with the April Fool's Crap by TeacherOfHeroes · · Score: 1

      Oi! Settle down!

      It's one day a year - if you really can't go that long without your slashdot fix and really can't take a joke, then maybe you have larger problems than "OMG!!! PONIES!!!"

      Just take a breath and go do something else like read a book or play an RPG...

    4. Re:Enough with the April Fool's Crap by ettlz · · Score: 3, Funny

      Look, it's the one day of the year that the Slashdot editors can get away with posting incoherent and/or unsubstantiated rubbish bearing little — if any — resemblance to the truth. So let them have their fun, OK?

    5. Re:Enough with the April Fool's Crap by xilmaril · · Score: 2, Informative

      Yes, actually. I've seen an extensive study on the subject of recursive humour, and it actually increases exponentially with each retelling. For more information, see here.

    6. Re:Enough with the April Fool's Crap by Cloud+9 · · Score: 3, Funny
      Look, it's the one day of the year

      *snort*

      --
      Karma: Dyn-o-mite!(mostly affected by Jimmy Walker reading your comments)
    7. Re:Enough with the April Fool's Crap by TeacherOfHeroes · · Score: 4, Funny

      it's the one day of the year that the Slashdot editors can get away with posting incoherent and/or unsubstantiated rubbish bearing little -- if any -- resemblance to the truth

      You must be new here...

    8. Re:Enough with the April Fool's Crap by CRC'99 · · Score: 0

      Posted by Zonk on 7:39 2nd April, 2006

      It's one day a year - if you really can't go that long without your slashdot fix and really can't take a joke, then maybe you have larger problems than "OMG!!! PONIES!!!"

      Looks like it's more than just one day... There is such a thing as flogging a dead horse... I believe we've passed that point quite some time ago...

      --
      Sendmail is like emacs: A nice operating system, but missing an editor and a MTA.
    9. Re:Enough with the April Fool's Crap by t-twisted · · Score: 1

      I'll take care of this:

      http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=181917&cid= 15041803

    10. Re:Enough with the April Fool's Crap by TeacherOfHeroes · · Score: 1

      Re:Enough with the April Fool's Crap (Score:2)
      by CRC'99 (96526) on Saturday April 01, @05:03PM (#15043301)

      I think its neat how you replied to this article before it was posted.

      Besides, they're clearly flogging dead ponies, not horses

    11. Re:Enough with the April Fool's Crap by pipingguy · · Score: 1


      You've been modded Troll, but you're right. This is just getting stupid.

    12. Re:Enough with the April Fool's Crap by rbarreira · · Score: 1

      Being right doesn't imply not being a troll.

      --

      The AACS key is NOT 0xF606EEFD628B1CA427BEA93A9CA9773F
  15. *gasp* by MK_CSGuy · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Think of the Slashdotting potential!

  16. Mirror by wildsurf · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Mirror

    --
    Weeks of coding saves hours of planning.
    1. Re:Mirror by Christopher+Rogers · · Score: 1

      Great now I can read the article.

    2. Re:Mirror by wildsurf · · Score: 1

      Wow. Whoever modded my post informative completely missed the joke. (Unless the mod itself was a joke...) I was going for +5 Redundant. :)

      --
      Weeks of coding saves hours of planning.
    3. Re:Mirror by wildsurf · · Score: 1

      Ugh, to get to +5 Redundant, it has to be modded Underrated a few times as well... guess I shot myself in the foot with that one. Ah well, karma to burn.

      --
      Weeks of coding saves hours of planning.
  17. Yo soy la persona del "karma whore" by 1053r · · Score: 0, Troll

    List of 2006/april/1 pranks on sites: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/April_1%2C_2006

    It's like a gigantic infinite loop... all those pages linking to one another... I've been clicking links for about 3 minutes now and still no article...

    OMG! Yay! i'm, like, soooo finally insightful !!! ;p mod +5 insightful, lol!!1!! like, IM me: this-slashdot-ponies-theme-sucks-big-cajones@aol.c om n dont forget my myspace page, lol: myspace.com/~pleaseadminsitsalreadyreallygettingol dsopleasecutitoutandstartpostinginterestingstories lmao, lol ;) d-_-b

  18. Tagging Beta by teknomage1 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Is it necessary to tag every story as gay?

    --
    Stop intellectual property from infringing on me
    1. Re:Tagging Beta by 1053r · · Score: 1

      On april 1, yes.

    2. Re:Tagging Beta by caffeination · · Score: 2, Funny

      Just you wait, they're going to have to hardcode a block for this, because it's going to run and run and run. Anything we don't like from now on? GAY! And every time, the gay rights nutters will scuttle out from under the fridge to complain.

    3. Re:Tagging Beta by DesireCampbell · · Score: 1

      Yes it is. There's too much "queer positive" stuff nowadays.No one's alowwed to say anything's 'gay'.

      Homosexuals aren't more special than me - I get to make fun of them just as much as I make fun of cripples and the ugly.

      --
      Whoo, signature!
      DesireCampbell.com
    4. Re:Tagging Beta by SpiritusGladius1517 · · Score: 0

      Agreed. As a straight man, I have been disenfranchised for far too long (roughly 18 hours, by my calculations) by these gay tags. After all, is it so unlikely that these stories might prefer the company of stories that are not like them (read: interesting)?

      --
      If the women don't find you handsome, they should at least find you handy.
    5. Re:Tagging Beta by Atzanteol · · Score: 1

      I think they'll do it until all the up-tight slashdotters either leave or develop a sense of humor...

      --
      "Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge"

      - Charles Darwin
    6. Re:Tagging Beta by tabby · · Score: 1

      Actually we come out of the closet to complain. Tom Cruise is in here. ;-)

      --
      I've experiments to run, there is research to be done on the people who are still alive.
    7. Re:Tagging Beta by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It depends on the intended context. If someone described something as being gay beacuse they thought it was happy, then there isn't a problem. However, if the intended meaning was that it was homosexual then that person is a moron since things without a sex cannot be homosexual. Simple really.

    8. Re:Tagging Beta by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, and the gay ladies in here want him out, he's converting too many of our number back.

  19. Definition by this+great+guy · · Score: 1

    Chained-slashdotting:
    n 1: cf. above slashdot article.

    1. Re:Definition by mikiN · · Score: 1

      Better yet, try this or this...
      Ahhh, I just love recursion...

      --
      The Hacker's Guide To The Kernel: Don't panic()!
  20. Enough Please by aardwolf64 · · Score: 2

    Ok guys... This has got to stop. RTFA at Wikipedia on April Fools... no jokes are supposed to be made after mid day. Sigh...
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/April_Fool's_Day

    1. Re:Enough Please by oilisgood · · Score: 1

      OMG FTFL.... In the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand the April 1 tradition exists, however it is accepted that if somebody pulls an April Fool's Trick after 12pm (mid-day), then the person pulling the trick is actually considered the fool (this caveat may also exist in other countries).

      So, if you are in these countries please do not read /. anymore today or you will turn /. posters into CUTE LITTLE PONIES!! OMG!!

    2. Re:Enough Please by kelnos · · Score: 1

      Er, the article you linked to says "In some countries, April Fools jokes must only be made before midday", without listing any countries, though it makes a reference to Australia later. It links to another article, which gives Ireland and Cypress as examples of countries where there aren't supposed to be jokes after midday. Doesn't sound like the majority of the world goes for this interpretation. I'd actually never heard of the after-midday "rule" until I started reading Slashdot a few years ago.

      --
      Xfce: Lighter than some, heavier than others. Just right.
  21. reverse by mennucc1 · · Score: 1

    does anyone how to play the game "reversed", that is, go up in the list of links?

    1. Re:reverse by mikiN · · Score: 1

      Sure! (That is, if you trust Google to do the backtracking for you.)
      Just follow the backlinks.
      - Make a list of the link URL(s) you want to backtrack.
      - For each link in your list, strip the "http://" part, add "link:" (drop the quotes, obviously) and feed what you're left with to Google.
      - Make a list of the URL(s) that Google returns.
      - (Optionally, retrieve the linked-to pages and scan the HTML source for the link URL to make sure the page is really a backlink. Be sure to also check for relative URLs.)
      - Lather, rinse, repeat (or recurse, for that matter.) until you have no more links left or you grow tired of all this, whichever happens first.

      I'm sure some bright mind can make a Perl script, Firefox plugin or whatever out of this, if this hasn't been done already.

      --
      The Hacker's Guide To The Kernel: Don't panic()!
  22. Absolutely. by Kelson · · Score: 1

    It seems that the cure for information overload is unlikely to be misinformation overload.

  23. Chill out by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    HAHA, you are all so serious. Chill out.

  24. the real cure for information overload by commodoresloat · · Score: 4, Informative

    is to mod this post +informative.

    1. Re:the real cure for information overload by Pneuma+ROCKS · · Score: 1

      Hey, it worked!

      --
      Favorite quote: "
  25. I, for one... by Kelson · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...welcome our new Information Overloads.

  26. link fixed: by mblase · · Score: 2, Informative

    http://www.gdrc.org/icts/i-overload/cure.html

    Thanks for ruining my fun, Google.

  27. I can't get the source by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    OMG those bloggers just can't link to source.SO annoying
    *click* *click* *click* *click* argggh

  28. Gay? by mblase · · Score: 2, Funny

    More like a circle jerk....

  29. Meta-tagging by Jugalator · · Score: 1

    straight, redundant, gay, stupid (tagging beta)

    Here's my meta-tag: wtf?

    --
    Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
  30. Best blonde joke ever by arvindn · · Score: 1
    I can't believe no one has mentioned The best blonde joke ever, which was the original circular linking prank.

    I'm also surprised a lot of posters seem to be seeing this sort of thing for the first time!

    1. Re:Best blonde joke ever by jc42 · · Score: 1

      But that blonde joke only goes a few hops before repeating. Has anyone reached a loop point in "The Cure for Information Overload"? I went about 20 hops (I'm waiting for some rice to finish cooking ;-), and I didn't hit any repeats. Google says there are 235 matches for that phrase, but they probably didn't do the scan in the past 24 hours. Whoever organized (?) this one seems to have recruited a lot of people willing to extend the chain.

      --
      Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
    2. Re:Best blonde joke ever by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, It was a long way in, but it looped eventually.

  31. YABBJ by krunk4ever · · Score: 1

    YABBJ (yet another best blond joke)

    --
    HD Trailers
  32. Best April Fool's joke so far by mpontes · · Score: 2
    Personally, I enjoyed this one. It illustrated well the nature of the Internet, someone finds something, links it to another person, that person links it again, repeat.

    I loved the different blog personas and their comments. I don't know, call me stupid, but there's just something about it that I can't help finding fascinating.

    --
    Bored? Browse Slashdot with a +6 modifier for Troll comme
  33. Just like every day on digg by PAPPP · · Score: 1

    Wow. Now /. is posting stories as obfuscated by blogs as the average post on digg.

  34. Best Joke by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    This is the best April Fool's joke I have seen today.

  35. Zangelding by TeknoHog · · Score: 1

    A related solution is offered at the Zangelding official home page.

    --
    Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
  36. Reaction thread by bar-agent · · Score: 1

    Holy recursion, Batman!

    I mean...like, omg, I clicked, like, 50 links? And I still don't know about that information overload thing, or whatever? But it just sounds so cool! I mean, like, my pony collection is totally out of control. But then my computer started making these beeping noises?

    --
    i'd hit it so hard, if you pulled me out you'd be the king of britain [bash.org]
  37. You can't count. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    I mean...like, omg, I clicked, like, 50 links?

    FWIW, it's a circular linked list of about 32 or so.

  38. what the heck a day by matthewchen · · Score: 0

    If everyday is april fool, ....

    --
    Megite: What's Happening Right Now
  39. APRIL FOOLS! by Eideteker · · Score: 1

    APRIL FOOLS!

    --
    sic
  40. The cure is simple: by mogwai7 · · Score: 2, Funny

    Stop all the downloadin!

  41. Don't Waste Your Time by Ranger · · Score: 1

    I got sent the retarded email. Gave up after three clicks and googled it. Here's the actual link. Not that I read the worthless piece of crap: http://www.gdrc.org/icts/i-overload/cure.html

    --
    "You'll get nothing, and you'll like it!"
  42. You've got it wrong. by Escogido · · Score: 1
    Chained-slashdotting: see chained-slashdotting.