Is the internet dead? Chris Anderson and Michael Wolff’s article The Web is Dead. Long Live The Internet. http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/08/ff_webrip/all/1 says the web as we knew it is. Both explain how the sleeker face of the web (apps, smart phones, IPads) are steering the web towards capitalistic use and further opportunity for profit. Our post-modern condition seems to be primarily concerned with material matters, validation and maximum efficiency. Portable web devices allow for all of these things: we can buy online with various apps created by food, clothing and service companies at the touch of an icon, we can update our thoughts, locations and actions on-the-go and we can do all of this while at work, school and just about anywhere else in a matter of seconds (maximum efficiency.) Gone are the days where we need to sit down and take time to access what the web has to offer…we carry it around everywhere with us. Anderson describes the “new web” as such:
‘It’s driven primarily by the rise of the iPhone model of mobile computing, and it’s a world Google can’t crawl, one where HTML doesn’t rule. And it’s the world that consumers are increasingly choosing, not because they’re rejecting the idea of the Web but because these dedicated platforms often just work better or fit better into their lives (the screen comes to them, they don’t have to go to the screen). The fact that it’s easier for companies to make money on these platforms only cements the trend. Producers and consumers agree: The Web is not the culmination of the digital revolution.’
As technology evolves, it seems the focus is marketing to an ever-growing crowd of multi-taskers who want a service brought to them-in their own environment. The article goes on to explain that the new web has no room for Google or Wikipedia where open-source reigns. When we look at advertising of a product, we realise there is a “buyer beware;” when we read online we need to realise there is now a “reader beware” with information we come across. Although there is so much more information available to us, it allows for more false information to become available. When something is published in an academic journal or a textbook, or an accredited book, it goes through so many hands to assure accuracy. One less level would be news websites and newspapers and magazines, these are usually accurate but we need to take with a grain of salt. Websites however, need to be taken with lots of salt. What makes open source web so phenomenal is also what is detrimental to it. Non-discriminating, no restrictions, free distribution; these allow the democratization of enterprise and distribution but it could also threaten to kill free information and knowledge in the good sense of those words if we continue to let people with money change the information to their benefit. I don’t think the open-source model is dying, I think the dynamics are changing. New interfaces allows for more corporate participation-and the facilitation of buying online pushes us to think of the new web in a business sense rather than its other qualities.
There should be walls put up preventing this from happening, but it is also our role as consumers to be aware that these things are going on, and understand that information is not necessarily truth, especially on the web. A website should be a base, like Wikipedia is used as a base, for information and further research. Things like check book journalism (paying money to obtain the most accurate information or quote) or paying money to change information online are not morally right-but we know they are done. Because of the advent of open-source, everyone can be a journalist, a historian, a political critic and so on which is great but the web doesn't discriminate against good or bad and truthful or untruthful information: anything goes. It is said that due to this, “truth becomes a commodity.” It is a service we can pay for, or pay to make untruthful to a benefit or detriment to an someone or something . This puts a price on information, which is quite the opposite of what open source web is supposed to be all about: free flow of information. Is this where Web 2.0 is headed? Does the “new” web operate solely by a commercial and promotional agenda? It only appears that way.
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