A conversation on facebook

I will (probably never) get around to reformatting this later, but in the interests of preserving some discussion about the internet:

John Gates The internet is a cesspool. Human discourse is doomed.

Tue at 10:25am · Comment ·

Susan Julian Gates

now what?

Tue at 10:54am · Delete

John Gates

Misanthropy is the only rational stance.

Tue at 10:57am · Delete

Kris Keimig

explain yourself. you sound like tipper gore.

Tue at 11:05am · Delete

Joseph Gagnepain

Do you think the internet has made discourse worse, or do you think it's simply given a medium to those who have no facilities for rational and coherent reasoning?

Tue at 11:26am · Delete

John Gates

A little from column A, a little from column B.

It's a perfect storm of ignorance and those who benefit from ignorance. Producing nothing, consuming everything.

Tue at 11:32am · Delete

Joseph Gagnepain

Well, and the gay's can come on here and talk about marrying each other...

Tue at 11:33am · Delete

Karen Olcott

Shows you how desperate people are to be heard!

Tue at 11:55am · Delete

Susan Julian Gates

Heard by whom? I think we have made a grave mistake in letting people believe that everyone has an opinion worthy of publication. (I am writing this knowing that I am writing my opinion!) Here's what happened thanks to the internet: Every town had the village idiot/crank/nutcase and everyone knew there was that one guy and KNEW he was an idiot/crank/nutcase. What's one in 20,000? Now with the internet ALL the idiots/cranks/nutcases can find each other and that means 12,500 of them and they sure can make a lot of noise and then Fox finds them and they become the "voice of the people," and so on and so on.

Tue at 12:14pm · Delete

John Gates

This is why we need to jettison the internet into the sun.

Tue at 12:15pm · Delete

Jason SooHoo

Do you guys want to play Farmville?

Tue at 12:20pm · Delete

John Gates

The signal to noise ratio in online communication is in free fall. Every webpage is three sentences of text surrounded by three acres of advertising disguised as content. The comments section of any given news article is inhabited by an astounding array of internet trolls.

There is more rational argument happening about World of Warcraft than there is about health care reform.

I hate the internet.

Tue at 12:22pm · Delete

Karen Olcott

what astounds me is that most people are essentially sheep....

Tue at 12:34pm · Delete

Joseph Gagnepain

I was being sarcastic with that comment, just to clarify...

Tue at 2:08pm · Delete

Michael T Garlick

People are Sheeple

Tue at 5:33pm · Delete

Frank Julian

Pull the lever!!!!

Tue at 5:59pm · Delete

Karen Olcott

Go get 'em Tiger, and I don't mean Woods either :)

Tue at 8:12pm · Delete

Kris Keimig

Here is my view: Everything is the same today as it was yesterday. The internet has only accelerated .

Like, I don't think there are MORE village idiots than there were before. I just think before you were only exposed to one of them and now you are instantly connected to an infinite number. The overall number hasn't changed...

I also don't think the signal to noise ratio is any different; I'm pretty sure we have enough [sardonic] literature to detail that loud, marauding, half-wit sheep have existed for eons and brought society to it's knees (or at least given us painful sleepless nights).

As for "three sentences of text surrounded by three acres of advertising disguised as content" I would point you in the direction of Cosmopolitan, GQ, etc... (all pre-internet piles of crap)

... really. By all of this what I mean to say is that I have always found what comes from 95% of people's brains (and out the mouths) tiring and loathsome. The internet has changed nothing in this regard.

Tue at 8:32pm · Delete

Kris Keimig

Two more things...

1) I make my living off the internet as a marketer (this is not a joke - I am basically Don Draper on the internet).

2) Did my last reply prove your initial point (this is my hope).

Tue at 8:34pm · Delete

Joseph Gagnepain

I think part of it is the ability to comment on every news story out there. This on the surface seems like a good idea, and certainly free speech and discourse about things are good, but they should be in a separate medium which I have the choice to view. For example, I'm not going to go to the Glen Beck page more then once and view the comments on...See More

Tue at 10:10pm · Delete

John Gates

Kris - that's true that the nature of people hasn't changed recently. But my point is actually that the terrain of the internet itself has changed. What was once a valuable resource for finding information has become cluttered with useless information and poisoned with deliberate misinformation.

Websites I once relied on for news are drifting from their original caliber into sound and light shows designed to get you to click through to another page to generate ad revenue - not to deliver actual information.

The signal to noise ratio IS different when 'bad' content grows and 'good' content shrinks. I'm not saying there are more useless idiots out there - humanity has always been composed of 100% useless idiot. But we hadn't figured out how to infect the internet with our idiocy. That time has come.

The ugly and wasteful websites now completely dominate the wonderful and useful. I can count on one hand the ones that aren't now pits of noise and garbage (and actually I am now rearranging my bookmark toolbar so those sites are at the front).

All I can do is vote with my feet and retreat to the places with valuable information and without poisonous irrational discourse. But it bothers me that the places I went first were corrupted by the familiar economics of advertising and the mysterious (and more frightening) forces of denialism. And it's the latter that should scare the rest of you. We're used to capitalism ruining a good thing, but this is different.

Wed at 8:36am · Delete

Karen Olcott

One of the best discussions ever, and appreciate the thoughtfulness. Now how do I share this convo?

Wed at 1:44pm · Delete

Frank Julian

You need to Stumbleupon!

Wed at 6:57pm · Delete

John Gates

I didn't know you could link directly to a status update, but apparently you can: http://www.facebook.com/n/?%2Fprofile.php&v=feed&story_fbid=214610708622&id=1044179139&mid=189ed1eG3e3ce8c3G12a0062G36

Yesterday at 10:35am · Delete

Kris Keimig

@John Gates I have [lots] more to say but I feel, at this point, to continue such a long-winded back and forth on your "status" will only cause discomfort for those writing or viewing status.

It will become truly awkward... like the day after... when you find out she is, as you had originally joked, related to you.

What I will suggest is that you continue the conversation on your blog; I will rebut on my blog and in the process of doing so, you will [hopefully] help defeat/revert your own point (by creating a valuable and healthy debate).

Conversely, we could both dress up as our favorite gem character, show up in Drum Hill, go to walmart, pig out at boston market and then play "nad kick" to see who is right.

Yesterday at 1:06pm · Delete