Well, Stoll was correct about the governmental aspect at least. Of course, his experiences pursuing Markus Hess made that quite evident, I'd assume.
Why the Web Won't Be Nirvana (1995)
21–30 of 56 posts
Re: Why the Web Won't Be Nirvana (1995)
#22Amazing how much everything has changed in 20 years as to make nearly every single sentence of this article wrong to a hilarious extent. Thank you for sharing this. It didn't tickle my intellectual curiosity, but it's a nice reminder of how bad humans can be at predicting even short-term changes. :)
I'm not so sure. I think most of what the article says about education is spot on. We have more efficient replacements for lecturers and (maybe?) textbooks, but not teachers.
Re: Why the Web Won't Be Nirvana (1995)
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think many people still undervalue the importance and impact of online social networks.
Can you elaborate?
I still hear and read people dismissing Facebook and Twitter as fads, as well as implying or saying outright that they have no actual value.
I think that their enormous popularity has demonstrated that even if these two particular services eventually die, online social networks are here to stay. We're social creatures, and in retrospect, it's obvious we would use the internet to socialize.
Re: Why the Web Won't Be Nirvana (1995)
#24Earlier quoted context omitted.
He was right about at least once major thing: tele-presence is largely a failure. It's 2015 and most of the Internet industry is concentrated within the Bay Area because people need to be near one another to interact richly. This is a direct demonstration of the failure of the Internet to permit truly rich long range human communication; the very people who build it can't use it to escape their local rent bubble desp…
I don't think it's a failure, it's just not ubiquitous. We have huge tele-presense units in most of our offices to facilitate meetings that used to require plane rides and hotels.
They also had hypertext in 1969:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJDv-zdhzMY
It's a failure in the sense that it's not generally available or in general use. I've also used tele-presence rooms before and they're not that great. Better than Skype or Google Hangouts, but not by much.
Re: Why the Web Won't Be Nirvana (1995)
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
Cryptocurrency for real-world mainstream commerce would get my vote. That will NEVER happen. It's only for buying pot, right?
My viewpoint is that things like Bitcoin are little more than cryptographically engineered Monopoly Money. That said, I do believe that eventually, paper money will go away (if for no other reason than to track every purpose for government surveillance).
Tongue in cheek: I believe this attitude proves grand parent. Of course, only if Bitcoin actually succeeds :)
Re: Why the Web Won't Be Nirvana (1995)
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
My viewpoint is that things like Bitcoin are little more than cryptographically engineered Monopoly Money. That said, I do believe that eventually, paper money will go away (if for no other reason than to track every purpose for government surveillance).
> My viewpoint is that things like Bitcoin are little more than cryptographically engineered Monopoly Money. Exactly like USD and all other first world currencies. Bitcoin is simply the next step in money.
It's not a next step because the US dollar is monopoly money forced on you by the government. Also it's supply is controlled to keep the value steady.
Bitcoin has nobody forcing you into using it and nobody controls the price. Bitcoins are just bits on a ledger that maybe someone will buy from you tomorrow, maybe.
Even in the niche roles where bitcoin is superior to bank accounts, credit cards, and cash, there is nothing beyond momentum keeping people from switching to another type of cyptocurrency. That's why it's monopoly money.
Re: Why the Web Won't Be Nirvana (1995)
#27Priceless! Cliff would not doubt have a good laugh at what he got wrong.
I was involved in a discussion this weekend that had a similar tone around people becoming too future aware. Specifically when you know a lot about the underlying technology (as Cliff does (and did) about networking) you tend to extrapolate what you know, but when you don't know anything about the underlying technology you tend to extrapolate your imagination.
People can imagine wondrous things. And when they tell an engineer to go build it, that engineer starts working backward from what would have to be true in order to have that amazing capability, and starts working on the pre-cursors.
Of all the things he got wrong I think there is a lot of resonance in the online education thing. I've done a few Coursera and MIT-X courses and while it could be my previous experience clouding my expectation, I personally learn better when the teacher is in the room and I can ask questions as they arise. Too often I start trying to answer a question to get clarity and get distracted into a whole new train of thought. That makes the learning process much slower and less satisfying for me.
Re: Why the Web Won't Be Nirvana (1995)
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can you elaborate?
I still hear and read people dismissing Facebook and Twitter as fads, as well as implying or saying outright that they have no actual value. I think that their enormous popularity has demonstrated that even if these two particular services eventually die, online social networks are here to stay. We're social creatures, and in retrospect, it's obvious we would use the internet to socialize.
I would call them bubbles not exactly fad's.
They both don't age well with younger or long time users. Worse, there monetization strategy is to annoy users. So, long term I expect there going to be replaced with much leaner organizations that need less revenue to make quarterly projections or just shrink.
So sure, social networks may be around, but message boards for example have evolved into some small, but reasonably profitable companies like Reddit.
PS: Long term Facebook might try the MS route of buying enough companies that something sticks. EX: MS Access. But, that says more about Money than Social Networks.
Re: Why the Web Won't Be Nirvana (1995)
#29Priceless! Cliff would not doubt have a good laugh at what he got wrong. I was involved in a discussion this weekend that had a similar tone around people becoming too future aware. Specifically when you know a lot about the underlying technology (as Cliff does (and did) about networking) you tend to extrapolate what you know, but when you don't know anything about the underlying technology you tend to extrapolate yo…
Agreed on education, in that what we currently have is not a replacement for a human teacher. But I think he still missed how valuable the internet now is for research of all levels, from the kind of research that gets published in academic journals, to the kind a 10-year-old does to learn about dinosaurs.
Re: Why the Web Won't Be Nirvana (1995)
#30Semi-OT: Kind of an odd metaphor to use, the year after the band Nirvana "ended" with the death of the lead. The web won't end with a shock to its head?
I see this problem a lot: even if you know what a metaphor refers to, it can be unclear how its use is intended:
arms-length transaction: so wait, within arms length, or beyond arms length? (The term is used for the latter.)
sanguine: sang ... blood? So you feel bloody about this? What does that have to do with optimism? (I know, the four humors thing, but it's still weird.)