An infinite number of monkeys?

Posted by Lapixx on Aug. 27, 2010, 1:33 p.m.

I somehow 'ran into' http://www.internetisshit.org/ again, and it made me think a bit about what the internet has done so far, and if it's really shit.

Especially the next part caught my attention:

"And look what we've done with it. Food wrappers and soap operas now tell us to visit their websites. Money is pumped online by people who can't even spell HTML. All manner of pointless and irritating content is continually poured down the infinite hole of data, unfiltered and over-appreciated. In accepting freedom of speech, we can't hide from its consequences - which in this case is millions of terabytes of unreliable information, badly designed and clumsily written. We have failed our own creation and given birth something truly awful. We're just too busy cooing over the pram to notice."

The creator of the website has some good points here. A large part of the world wide web (I think saying 'the Internet' is somewhat misplaced) is crap, and the only reason some things exists is because it's relatively easy and cheap to put something online.

On the other hand, I (and most likely very much other people) use the WWW quite often, and I assume I wouldn't be doing that if everything on it was crap. Social networking websites (how overhyped some might be) enable you to meet new (and potentially interesting) people you wouldn't have 'known' otherwise. Sharing information is easy and fast, even if there are enough places that contain false data. People with the same interests start communities you maybe couldn't start in real life, etc.

The question is of course, if you'd call all this really useful. Maybe the writer is right and we should stop "aimlessly surfing for something amusing when we could actually be doing something fun"?

What do you think?

Comments

Lapixx 14 years, 3 months ago

@Toast: Well, I meant that when people take things too serious it can affect you as well. So I suppose you should care about how other people live their lives (at least, when large numbers of people are starting to behave in the same way).

"without any social consequence"

Would you still call it socializing then? Anonymous is everyone and nobody at the same time. You aren't really interacting with anybody because you are part of the same thing. Maybe it's good to hear some opinions of different people when they are anonymous (because that's the only moment people say what they really think), but when looking at something like 4chan..?

Also, I'm merely asking for your opinions, so if I sound like I'm defending the author's opinion too much, I'm not.

@Kilin: It's a mystery I'll solve later. By myself.

Leyenda 14 years, 3 months ago

The author doesn't understand there's nothing "new" about misinformation on the internet. People have ALWAYS generated this crap.

The only difference now is that its accessible to everyone.

In the pre-internet days, you had to go to a rally/meeting of screwballs to hear them blathering about their theories. Now, you can just browse their sites. Not much difference, really.

blueBX 14 years, 3 months ago

Quote: 4 of 11
If one website says something about anything, it's more than likely pure invention and shouldn't be taken seriously
www.internetisshit.org

On a more serious note, the internet is a very helpful tool. Why:

1) Helped me find more math/physics examples when my book/teacher failed.

2) Keep in touch with family/friends using free services like social networking sites, email, im, etc

3) Join communities you wouldn't normally find around your area (64D)

4) Find amusing articles/rants (some people consider this fun)

5) Easier to find deals (it's a pain in the ass going store to store)

6) Easier to apply to jobs/schools, find tutorials (you could be looking at a C++ tutorial and in a few seconds switch to a cheesecake tutorial), etc

If crap on the internet is really bugging you, why are you searching for it? It isn't like you automatically get sent to some crappy site once you open up your browser. In the end, the internet is just another tool.

Cesque 14 years, 3 months ago

The Internet is publically available as a service for about 30 years, and during those 30 years, it impacted the spread of information and commerce more than the printing press and the industrial revolution had over 400 years.

The Internet is, like it or not, a technological singularity. Things are being transferred from non-Internet to Internet, not the other way around.

Some of your arguments sound like you're 5 years old writing a school esay. It's not that Google and Wikipedia and eBay are making things easier for people. It's that if you suddenly shut them off, quite a large number of people would get lost in the modern world as if somebody dropped them off into the middle of the Pacific Ocean from a plane, and the economical impact of the Internet's collapse would be comparable to a sudden oil crisis.

Quote:
The author doesn't understand there's nothing "new" about misinformation on the internet. People have ALWAYS generated this crap.

The only difference now is that its accessible to everyone.

In the pre-internet days, you had to go to a rally/meeting of screwballs to hear them blathering about their theories. Now, you can just browse their sites. Not much difference, really.

Actually, heh, as I was just telling my friend ghg over the irc today, if it wasn't for the media (primarily the Internet) nobody would give a fuck that some Danish nutheads drew Muhammad cartoons or that Michael Jackson died. Of course, there's always TV and newspapers, so it's about media in general.

But talking about misinformation - the Internet also made 95% of claims made by random people verifiable.

Leyenda 14 years, 3 months ago

All good points Cesque.

Quote:
The Internet is, like it or not, a technological singularity.

hmmm. I prefer to call it paradigm shift, since it's more about the "means of content distribution", rather than the content itself.

Lapixx 14 years, 3 months ago

Some of your arguments sound like you're 5 years old writing a school esay

Not too subtle… I wanted to hear some opinions, not convincing you to support a claim.

@blueBX: Yeah, that's somewhat ironic :)

@Leyenda: Note that the website/'article' isn't about misinformation only.

Leyenda 14 years, 3 months ago

Quote:
@Leyenda: Note that the website/'article' isn't about misinformation only.
Mostly it was – or at least about lack of careful references and original research, and our assumptions about accuracy when we see something posted. He makes that classic point about how poor information gets "validated" by other websites posting similar poor information.

Castypher 14 years, 3 months ago

There was even going to be a party for you. A big party that all your friends were invited to. I invited your best friend, the Companion Cube. Of course, he couldn't come because you murdered him. All your other friends couldn't come, either, because you don't have any other friends because of how unlikable you are. It says so right here in your personnel file: "Unlikable. Liked by no one. A bitter, unlikable loner, whose passing shall not be mourned. Shall NOT be mourned." That's exactly what it says. Very formal. Very official. It also says you were adopted, so that's funny, too.

Lapixx 14 years, 3 months ago

True. Those parts didn't made me think of the subject though, it was mainly the idea that the internet is somewhat overrated. ("But still we praise the internet for everything (…) and discarding anything outside it as 'out of touch'.")

As Cesque pointed out, "quite a large number of people would get lost in the modern world as if somebody dropped them off into the middle of the Pacific Ocean" when (parts of) the internet would be shut down. I guess becoming dependent of technology is not that new either though.

Cesque 14 years, 3 months ago

Quote:
hmmm. I prefer to call it paradigm shift, since it's more about the "means of content distribution", rather than the content itself.

A paradigm shift is a change of perception of the world in scientific terms with which the Internet has nothing to do. And well, the printing press was also just a change in "means of content distribution".