That’s why one’s own education is important – and articles like these serve a valuable purpose. I absolutely adore the democratization of information of the internet. I was an early internet advocate in the early 1990s as I was VERY VERY very very lucky to have been in a place and time (and scholarship funds) to have had access. I wanted EVERYBODY online. But I also wanted free text. One of my first databases was a thing called “MemoryMate”. It was an early freeform database, allowing for some structure or no structure intermingled at will. I worked a little with “dBase” after this, and then Access and SQL and whatnot, but I liked the freeform way best. Early internet, I loved the aesthetics of Gopher but found myself using Veronica and Archie (freeform text searches) and not its nicely laid out hierarchical system. I rooted for Gopher but WWW won out with its hyperlinks and hypertext networked format. But hypertext, while great for moving from document to document, soon founded itself into curated hierarchies which was difficult to use. Google took a side feature (search which all programs and sites had somewhere) and made it their only feature (so it seemed). My answer is: watch the watchers. Learn to curate data and spot bs. But I wouldn’t lament regular people wanting computers to do the work for them. That’s precisely why we have them. Or filing systems. Or any of it.

I absolutely adore the democratization of information of the internet. I was an early internet advocate in the early 1990s as I was VERY VERY very very lucky to have been in a place and time (and scholarship funds) to have had access.

I wanted EVERYBODY online.

But I also wanted free text. One of my first databases was a thing called “MemoryMate”. It was an early freeform database, allowing for some structure or no structure intermingled at will.

I worked a little with “dBase” after this, and then Access and SQL and whatnot, but I liked the freeform way best.

Early internet, I loved the aesthetics of Gopher but found myself using Veronica and Archie (freeform text searches) and not its nicely laid out hierarchical system.

I rooted for Gopher but WWW won out with its hyperlinks and hypertext networked format.

But hypertext, while great for moving from document to document, soon founded itself into curated hierarchies which was difficult to use.

Google took a side feature (search which all programs and sites had somewhere) and made it their only feature (so it seemed).

My answer is: watch the watchers. Learn to curate data and spot bs. But I wouldn’t lament regular people wanting computers to do the work for them. That’s precisely why we have them. Or filing systems. Or any of it.

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