Stephen Fry and the internet
11/03/09 11:12 Filed in: Internet
My thoughts on
this article from Stephen Fry about him and the
Internet.
I’ve got to say that I am big fan of Stephen Fry
and so an article by him on about the internet,
how could I resist.
So he is the has the second biggest following on Tiwtter of anyone. Mmm, impressive, but I’m still not sure I get Tiwtter, okay that’s not true I understand what it is and basically how it works, and I can see for someone well known what a useful tool it can be, but for me? Well I don’t think anyone would follow me, since my tweets would probably be something like this
Got up, had breakfast, when to work, had lunch, got home, when to bed
Not exactly thrilling is it! Maybe it’s something I have to try to ‘get’, but again since no one I know uses tiwtter (they all like me don’t get it) I don’t think I’ll bother.
I do like the analogy of the internet being a city, this works for me. And just as you would find it more of less impossible to regulate who lives in a city, likewise it is impossible to regulate what gets posted on the internet. So we shouldn’t even try. Now I’m not saying some things shouldn’t be stamped out wherever they appear, like child pornography, which is utterly evil and totally repugnant to any right thinking person. What I am saying that attempts to control content, like those attempted in China and the ones proposed in Australia are very expensive, difficult to maintain and in the end not very effective.
Ah yes web snobbery. I confess that I am indeed a web snobb. I do tent to scoff when I see AOL or hotmail email addresses, yet oddly I don’t when I see a gmail address. Why should that be?
Maybe because in the UK at least it means you where an early adopter, since after 2005 (I think) you got a googlemail address instead (apparently there is European trademark on gmail). But then again maybe it’s just because Google has a certain level of...well coolness attached to it, much in the same way Apple does. All of this just goes to show how silly this sort of snobbery really is!
But on this subject there is one thing that I just don’t get and that is small companies that have these sorts of email addresses. There is really no excuse for that! Domain names and hosting accounts are so cheap now days and setting one up is not that difficult, okay so I’m saying that and I’m an expert in these things, but it can’t to hard to find an expert to do this for you can it. Well if it is maybe you could contact me and I could do it!
Abbreviations in text and indeed in txt! Thats another thing that I have real problems reading, but I don’t think that I have an actual problem with the concept. I say I think, because I’ve covered this another post and I’m still not sure if I think it’s a good thing or not!
Books and the web, ah yes, now there is another thing I know all about. A quick count of the books that surround me in my living room show that are about 260 of things. There is probably the same again (maybe slightly less) in my bedroom. And if any more prof where needed that the web does not mean the end printed books, probably a good 25% of these books are on computer and internet related subjects!
Okay, that’s about it for this very rambling post. I should get back to some real work now!
So he is the has the second biggest following on Tiwtter of anyone. Mmm, impressive, but I’m still not sure I get Tiwtter, okay that’s not true I understand what it is and basically how it works, and I can see for someone well known what a useful tool it can be, but for me? Well I don’t think anyone would follow me, since my tweets would probably be something like this
Got up, had breakfast, when to work, had lunch, got home, when to bed
Not exactly thrilling is it! Maybe it’s something I have to try to ‘get’, but again since no one I know uses tiwtter (they all like me don’t get it) I don’t think I’ll bother.
I do like the analogy of the internet being a city, this works for me. And just as you would find it more of less impossible to regulate who lives in a city, likewise it is impossible to regulate what gets posted on the internet. So we shouldn’t even try. Now I’m not saying some things shouldn’t be stamped out wherever they appear, like child pornography, which is utterly evil and totally repugnant to any right thinking person. What I am saying that attempts to control content, like those attempted in China and the ones proposed in Australia are very expensive, difficult to maintain and in the end not very effective.
Ah yes web snobbery. I confess that I am indeed a web snobb. I do tent to scoff when I see AOL or hotmail email addresses, yet oddly I don’t when I see a gmail address. Why should that be?
Maybe because in the UK at least it means you where an early adopter, since after 2005 (I think) you got a googlemail address instead (apparently there is European trademark on gmail). But then again maybe it’s just because Google has a certain level of...well coolness attached to it, much in the same way Apple does. All of this just goes to show how silly this sort of snobbery really is!
But on this subject there is one thing that I just don’t get and that is small companies that have these sorts of email addresses. There is really no excuse for that! Domain names and hosting accounts are so cheap now days and setting one up is not that difficult, okay so I’m saying that and I’m an expert in these things, but it can’t to hard to find an expert to do this for you can it. Well if it is maybe you could contact me and I could do it!
Abbreviations in text and indeed in txt! Thats another thing that I have real problems reading, but I don’t think that I have an actual problem with the concept. I say I think, because I’ve covered this another post and I’m still not sure if I think it’s a good thing or not!
Books and the web, ah yes, now there is another thing I know all about. A quick count of the books that surround me in my living room show that are about 260 of things. There is probably the same again (maybe slightly less) in my bedroom. And if any more prof where needed that the web does not mean the end printed books, probably a good 25% of these books are on computer and internet related subjects!
Okay, that’s about it for this very rambling post. I should get back to some real work now!
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