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October 14, 2005
Is it just me
- or is anyone else getting bemused -if not a little freaked out by how all the big guns on the internets all want to be the same.
I mean everyone, meaning Google, Yahoo, MSN have their own search, web mail, groups, photo albums, blog spaces, news feeds, (only google hasn’t a music shop -yet) instant messaging/voice over internet programs and they’re all clamouring for us to use their own versions of ‘your’ own ‘personalised’ (utterly dreary) start/home page (we used to call them ‘portals’ they were all the rage once - I’ve always hated portals - which why I guess I still avoid using them even now. I don't even have a start/home page - I hate them too. Does that make me a bad person? I also resent how they try to tie you in so they can track your browsing behaviour (with cookies and various `web beacons') so they can sell on that information to advertising companies so they in turn can bombard us with their inane `targeted’ commericals. I use adblock and I use it like crazy.)
So as they’re gradually all becoming clones of one another - basically trying to be a one-stop shop for all your internet needs - what’s the point exactly? I’ll wager they don’t even know themselves - they’re just doing it because they see everyone else doing it. It's as if they all want to be AOL or something. *Shudders.*
Posted by groc on October 14, 2005 11:45 AM
Comments
McInternet here we come...
wibbled by: JB at October 15, 2005 09:17 PM
In a lot of cases competition on such a massive scale induces homogeny. Just look at pre-cable american tv, for example. The "big three" all competed to be the least different.
There's all this hype about "web 2.0", but it's really just "the web", but you don't have to reload the page as often. Big deal. It's not a fundamental change, like cable was for tv. Something will come along one day and _really_ completely redefine the web. I wouldn't be surprised if it's sometime soon.
Oh, and you're right. All the cool dudes have about:blank as their homepage.
wibbled by: leff at October 17, 2005 08:49 AM
Hmmm. Look at all that space. It looked good in the preview...
wibbled by: leff at October 17, 2005 09:43 PM
well I did notice you added a lot of extra br /s in there. MT adds it's own for every return so...
wibbled by: groc at October 17, 2005 09:48 PM