How the Internet Became a Closed Shop

AcidAUS sends this quote from the Sydney Morning Herald: "A little over a decade ago, just before the masses discovered the digital universe, the internet was a borderless new frontier: a terra nullius to be populated by individuals, groups and programmers as they saw fit. There were few rules and no boundaries. Freedom and open standards, sharing information for the greater good was the ethos. Today, the open internet we once knew is fracturing into a series of gated communities or fiefdoms controlled by giants like Apple, Google, Facebook, Amazon and to a lesser extent Microsoft. A billion-dollar battle conducted in walled cities where companies try to lock our consumption into their vision of the internet. It has left some lamenting the 'web we lost.'"

Comments

Related Anil Dash Blogs and earlier /. discussion

[xmas2003]

The Sydney Morning Herald article may have been sparked by Anil Dash's recent Blog Post - The Web We Lost ... which was discussed on /. last week.

Anil also wrote a followup titled "Rebuilding the Web We Lost" that may be worth reading.

Speaking of the "lost web", we no longer see as many offbeat websites like this one ... HO-HO-HO! ;-)

Re:yeah yeah

[PRMan]

Ecclesiastes 7:10 Don’t long for “the good old days.” This is not wise.