Revolution, finally

An off topic entry in my electronic diary, but I've noticed recently that the internet is finally changing for the better. I've been using the internet since 1990 or so, and although I'm only semi-literate when it comes to computers, I've kept myself somewhat up-to-date on what's going on.

Some years back the WWW started going downhill big time. At first, when Google appeared it was a great thing - but these days, the first 20 or so results are not what you need but commercial sites that exploit the way google works.

Now this: blogs. The world wide web is exploding, and it's becoming again what it was originally intended to be: A web of freely flowing information, where everyone has an equal opportunity to publish. The result? Blessed anarchy. The commercial powers are losing the game. People are linked to people, individuals are expressing themselves, and finding each other. And what creativity, so much talent!

And the search engines? Google is still great for finding the most relevant sites, if you know which keywords to use and which ones to avoid. But Google is not up-to-date. Many blogs (even Blogger blogs) are not found by google at all! And niche sites with few references to them are hard to find. Yahoo search is much better for bypassing the google-optimized commercial sites, and also for finding new stuff, recently published blogs, etc. Then there's Technorati of course, a great search tool for bloggers and their readers.

Having said that, Google scores big time with a new innovation again. I just got a gmail account, thanks to Dan. My first impression: this is how e-mail should be. I hope it will become available to everyone soon.

The commercial powers are looking to dominate the blogosphere, for sure. But I have a feeling we are making history now. The world of information is changing, and bloggers are the pioneers.

I know that all of this is probably yesterday's news to any hard-core bloggers out there, and that the whole phenomenon has already been analyzed to death by greater minds, probably sprouted a few Ph.D. dissertations, too, but I felt like writing this down anyway.

P.S. Thanks to New Links for the Technorati icons.