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What I want from the internet

chrbutler.com

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Re: What I want from the internet

#51

Post by DamnInteresting »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #49
DamnInteresting wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Entirely you say? I was addressing this portion of your comment: > I'm pretty darn sure I'm not the only independent content creator being largely ignored, attacked for "self promotion" I agree whole-heartedly with your share it sentiment, but if that was your original point, it was unfortunately obscured.

It's a no win situation. People ignore independent creatives while consuming more established and popular media. Share your own work, people attack you. Meanwhile if you don't share your work, no one sees it. Then you read articles whining about how hard it is to find interesting content and escape the prison of social media. It's not because independent creators don't exist. But there are a lot of barriers to gettin…

> It's a no win situation

Exactly! That's what I meant by tragedy of the commons. It sucks for everybody, consumers and creators alike, and there is no satisfactory solution. I empathize, I am an independent creator myself, and I know the pain. For what it's worth, it helped me to change my mindset from sprint to marathon, and accept that success, if any, would be slow.

I also feel that the modern web's lust for stats is doing more harm than good. If one's follower count isn't growing, the dopamine dries up. Falling listener stats? Enjoy that depression! Better to ignore the stats and use "is this still worthwhile" as one's compass when possible.

Re: What I want from the internet

#52

Post by StrictDabbler »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #3

> And the internet used to be more work to experience. Today, it’s more work to avoid. Since the author likes analogies, I'll add mine: the internet now has become roads, bridges, towns. The internet used to be forests, rivers to ford, camps. There used to be an exploration-aspect to the internet, not sure what you would find if you took this trail or that one. Now we all seem to travel the few, well-worn roads to th…

I recently googled something like "modal fabric weave diagram".

On my phone I was given five places to buy modal clothing and a message that "x other similar results have been omitted".

I persisted, I rephrased. I was asked if I was a robot, I clicked on CAPTCHAs, and now Google is willing to give me some results that are relevant to textile design but I still haven't been able to find out what weave patterns are common in modern modal fabrics.

On my work computer Google knows I'm an engineer so it gives me papers on visco-elastic properties of the fabric but it's not actually processing my query well and giving me weaves, it's just saying "I guess you're fancy and technical, huh?"

In 1997 there would have been a text/image website with forty diagrams of various weave patterns and it would have come up in the top twenty results.

I would like a little more 1997 in my internet, please.

Re: What I want from the internet

#53

Post by Minor49er »

StrictDabbler wrote: post #52
JKCalhoun wrote: post #3

> And the internet used to be more work to experience. Today, it’s more work to avoid. Since the author likes analogies, I'll add mine: the internet now has become roads, bridges, towns. The internet used to be forests, rivers to ford, camps. There used to be an exploration-aspect to the internet, not sure what you would find if you took this trail or that one. Now we all seem to travel the few, well-worn roads to th…

I recently googled something like "modal fabric weave diagram". On my phone I was given five places to buy modal clothing and a message that "x other similar results have been omitted". I persisted, I rephrased. I was asked if I was a robot, I clicked on CAPTCHAs, and now Google is willing to give me some results that are relevant to textile design but I still haven't been able to find out what weave patterns are com…

You might have better luck using a search engine like Fireball

https://fireball.com/

Re: What I want from the internet

#54

Post by bombcar »

gonzo41 wrote: post #31
JKCalhoun wrote: post #3

> And the internet used to be more work to experience. Today, it’s more work to avoid. Since the author likes analogies, I'll add mine: the internet now has become roads, bridges, towns. The internet used to be forests, rivers to ford, camps. There used to be an exploration-aspect to the internet, not sure what you would find if you took this trail or that one. Now we all seem to travel the few, well-worn roads to th…

I describe it as, the internet of books and text became the internet of videos and music. Not better or worse just different.

It went from an Internet of amateurs (those with an actual love for what they are talking about) to professionals (which are very slick, but the money is always there).

You can still find great content in videos and music from amateurs, but the professionals "outshout" most of them; and the best amateurs end up getting sucked into being professionals. Once your livelihood is on the line, things change.

Re: What I want from the internet

#55

Post by kanzure »

StrictDabbler wrote: post #52
JKCalhoun wrote: post #3

> And the internet used to be more work to experience. Today, it’s more work to avoid. Since the author likes analogies, I'll add mine: the internet now has become roads, bridges, towns. The internet used to be forests, rivers to ford, camps. There used to be an exploration-aspect to the internet, not sure what you would find if you took this trail or that one. Now we all seem to travel the few, well-worn roads to th…

I recently googled something like "modal fabric weave diagram". On my phone I was given five places to buy modal clothing and a message that "x other similar results have been omitted". I persisted, I rephrased. I was asked if I was a robot, I clicked on CAPTCHAs, and now Google is willing to give me some results that are relevant to textile design but I still haven't been able to find out what weave patterns are com…

It would be a lot better if you could just search an index of all the words on the web, and then we can refine our queries against the results to narrow things down even more. As it is right now, search just doesn't work anymore.

Re: What I want from the internet

#56

Post by pixl97 »

StrictDabbler wrote: post #52
JKCalhoun wrote: post #3

> And the internet used to be more work to experience. Today, it’s more work to avoid. Since the author likes analogies, I'll add mine: the internet now has become roads, bridges, towns. The internet used to be forests, rivers to ford, camps. There used to be an exploration-aspect to the internet, not sure what you would find if you took this trail or that one. Now we all seem to travel the few, well-worn roads to th…

I recently googled something like "modal fabric weave diagram". On my phone I was given five places to buy modal clothing and a message that "x other similar results have been omitted". I persisted, I rephrased. I was asked if I was a robot, I clicked on CAPTCHAs, and now Google is willing to give me some results that are relevant to textile design but I still haven't been able to find out what weave patterns are com…

In 1997 there wouldn't have been 50,000 spam responses in the query.

In 1997 there would have been some place that made it, or someone interested in it that would have made the site for their own interests in spreading the information.

Today there are countless entities looking to scrape a penny from your view in any way possible, and will create an ocean of spam in order to capture that revenue.

At least with search engines we cannot go back. That internet is dead. Any new system you create to bring back the old internet will attract the previous group because your system would be valuable, and like parasites, they will steal value from your system.

Re: What I want from the internet

#57

Post by pixl97 »

reaperducer wrote: post #36
gonzo41 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I describe it as, the internet of books and text became the internet of videos and music. Not better or worse just different.

I describe it as, the internet of books and text became the internet of videos and music. Except that the internet never was books, and was only text due to technological limitations. When we started networking all the computers together, we (myself included) had this vision of an information utopia where everyone would be able to access all of the information previously locked up in books, magazines, and newspapers.…

> had this vision of an information utopia where everyone

When it comes to new technology and the impact it will have people are almost always wrong. The printing press not only made better books, it created oceans of shitty ones.

We didn't have https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandolini%27s_law at the time to warn us.

Re: What I want from the internet

#58

Post by pixl97 »

DamnInteresting wrote: post #30
DoreenMichele wrote: post #7

I'm pretty darn sure I'm not the only independent content creator being largely ignored, attacked for "self promotion" if they post their own work while no one else ever posts it etc and then listening to people whine about the internet and how they wish this, that or the other while you roll your eyes and think to yourself again "This is the internet you helped create. If you don't like it, make other choices."

The problem isn't self-promotion per se, the problem is the sheer amount of self-promotion that occurs when it is allowed. If any is permitted, then often all is permitted, and a forum becomes inundated with people vying for attention. Classic tragedy of the commons.

> and a forum becomes inundated with people vying for attention

You mean spam. Any system in which does not quickly and harshly punish spam will quickly be crushed under its weight ruining the perceived value that attracted users to the service in the first place.

Re: What I want from the internet

#59

Post by pixl97 »

intrasight wrote: post #23

I like to consider what will the Internet be in ten years. Who will control it? How will we interact with it? Will there be any humans present? Frankly, I am not too optimistic that it'll be the Internet that we want.

People say its "dead internet theory", but I think Thoughty2 correctly calls it "dead internet prophecy"

Re: What I want from the internet

#60

Post by chrbutler »

pixl97 wrote: post #57
reaperducer wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I describe it as, the internet of books and text became the internet of videos and music. Except that the internet never was books, and was only text due to technological limitations. When we started networking all the computers together, we (myself included) had this vision of an information utopia where everyone would be able to access all of the information previously locked up in books, magazines, and newspapers.…

> had this vision of an information utopia where everyone When it comes to new technology and the impact it will have people are almost always wrong. The printing press not only made better books, it created oceans of shitty ones. We didn't have https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandolini%27s_law at the time to warn us.

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