A couple years back, my director asked our department if the internet was a good or bad thing. Being part of the eBusiness team, the majority of people said it was good, and why. While I didn’t disagree with them, I played devil’s advocate and said “bad” with a specific reason. A here it is.

The internet is….monstrous in size. There’s so much information. An unfathomable bottomless pit that continues to grow. All this information is stored in mere zeros and ones (0 & 1 – that’s binary folks). The way this information is stored, the way it’s backed up, and the fact that these simple 0s and 1s can transfer to very far locations in an instant effectively means this content is easily preserved. It’s too early to say it will last forever, but I wouldn’t doubt that were possible. Media storage continues to grow at a rate that is quicker than information continues to be added to the internet. What I’m trying to get at is this internet is still growing. The information is still growing. And we’ve got an infinite amount of space to store it.

The next issue is: how much of the content is useless? How much of it is repeated facts, human stupidity, irrelevant content, guides to the same thing, guides to outdated things, etc. The internet is growing but how much of it is useful? Why do we use Google search but often find it impossible to get what we’re looking for. I’m going to assume we correctly use keywords and I trust Google’s search algorithm and its capabilities but why is it that if I look up pV=nRT (Ideal Gas Law), while I do get some valid websites, I also get mr. random grade 11 science student feeding false information in a forum to mr. random grade 10 science student.

The internet is infinite. Human stupidity is endless. Real facts and useful information actually limited in comparison.

I believe the rate of useless information is growing at a far more significant rate than useful information. The internet has only been heavily used for a few years. Give it 20 years, give it 50. Remember to take into account that the information on the internet never dies. 0s and 1s don’t degrade like paper. This infinite beast of the internet grows and grows.

My concern is that valuable, useful, relevant information becomes lost. The internet, its primary purpose of storing and accessing information, will lose its value. Its strength in user generated content is also its weakness and downfall because of endless human stupidity.

I’m not sure what would replace the internet. I’m not sure how long it will last. I’m not sure if the information on the internet can possibly be reorganized. I’m sure people won’t go back and delete useless content. I’m sure people will still post “First!” in forums despite the obvious lack of value in its post.

I’m completely aware that this was just a devil’s advocate post. I love the internet and almost everything about it. I just think that it’s fundamentally flawed. Do I have a better idea? no. Can human stupidity ever stop interfering with the greatness of our people? no. Do I realize the irony that human stupidity is all relative that someone out there is thinking the same thing about a post like this? yes.

The internet is huge. And I’m just one of the stupid people filling it with useless, irrelevant content.