One big hyperlinked world
by Bob on February 18, 2008
I was reading a book recently, and it wasn't very recent in publication, but feeling that "oldies are goodies" and the fact that I was waiting for someone, and the book was on a nearby shelf, I read the book. It was a techie book, but mitigated with some great quotes and insights and a bit of a sense of humour. The book was "The Essential Client/Server Survival Guide" by Robert Orfali, Dan Harley, and Jeri Edwards, published in 1996 by Wiley.
One quote which stunned me when I had read to page 463 (I was waiting for someone for quite a while) was:
"The world becomes one big hyperlinked document".
Another quote which was true but also poignant was by Eric Schmidt, CTO (Chief Technology Officer) of Sun Microsystems said in 1995, which read:
"The internet is the world's largest experiment in Anarchy".
Both quotes are worth considering seriously.
It does appear that the world has become one huge hyperlinked document ! We humans are all connected now by things like email, MySpace, and Instant Messengers. And the basic material of the internet and browers are content pointed to by hyperlinks. And computer programs and robots are also connected to us humans in this framework, insidiously indistinguishable from real human beings.
And the implication is that WE humans are now just a bunch of hyperlinks, too. No soul, no eyebrows, but just another item to click on in a world of hypertext links.
It's true for email largely too. People sending an email just click on someone's name in the "to" field, with reckless abandon as to what their real email address is which they don't have to remember anymore because the sender can just click on the name and IT supplies the underlying email address.
The same sort of thing happens too with cellphones. I push a button for "Jim" and I no longer have to remember Jim's phone number since it dials it for me. So it's a kind of hyperlink too. And if someone loses his cellphone, he can't call anyone's real number because he only dialed by name on his phone.
It's a scary concept that the whole world and the people in it are now just a set of cold hyperlinks. We lost our humanity and became like robots in the process. And we became an object of technology no longer a touchy-feely face-to-face human being.
That reminds me of a brilliantly pre-sagacious and important television show in the 1960s called "The Prisoner". The main character and everyone in this secluded village had lost their names and had become a number. Like Number Six, the main character. And Number Six always said "I am not a number, I am a human being!". Well that amazed me in 1968 on a network channel. Since then the series which only lasted one season has a cultish following for it's social implications and brilliance.
But the danger was spelled out then. Losing our humanity and becoming a cold calculated number. Or a hyperlink on someone's browser window.
Now we have forgotten we have become a cold number and it seems even a bit comfortable to insulate ourselves from others this way with a cloak of technological fodder keeping our face out of the picture oddly enough. And that's insidious.
About the second quote that the internet is the "biggest experiment in anarchy", well it's true also. And almost equally scary. I'm not sure that the early 20th century anarchist, the late Emma Goldman, would have agreed, but it's certainly quite true.
There is no central power or authority on the internet. Yes, you still have to go to IANA to get IP addresses and assignments, I think. But in everyday practice, there is no one supervising the internet for its content and truthfulness. And almost anything goes politically and otherwise, within reason. Or not within reason.
So it's by definition out of control which is also a pretty good working attribute of anarchy itself. So Eric Schmidt was right in saying it.
Both statements should cause us to pause about the rampaging of the elephant known as modern technology. But the elephant perhaps should not or cannot be stopped. We have all succumbed to it.
We better think about it. I don't really want to be a hyperlink and have people only clicking on me. I'd like a real in-person kiss on Valentines Day for example. Animated GIFs and JPEGs just don't do it for me. Or do they now ? Scary.