Information wants to be free - or does it?
| Another point made by Goldsmith and Wu in their book, "Who controls the Internet: Illusions of a Borderless World" - see previous post. They quote John Perry Barlow's famous dictum, that: "Information wants to be free," but they give the rejoinder: "...information does not, in fact, want to be free. It wants to be labeled, organized, and filtered so it can be discovered, cross-referenced and consumed." To repeat the point I make in my previous post, I can't help thinking that Goldsmith and Wu are either missing the point or are deliberately misinterpreting Barlow's use of the word 'free'. Barlow, I feel, would be happy to concede that we are free to make whatever use of information we choose, including labeling, organizing and filtering it so that it can be discovered! NB I came across a useful blog from a librarian who is also a Web 2.0 exponent, Meredith Farkas. Her blog title? 'Information wants to be free'. |
© John Connell
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Comments on "Information wants to be free - or does it?"
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Ewan McIntosh said ... (August 15, 2006 10:28 AM) :
post a commentYeah - thinking 'free' and 'organised' are two separate concepts that can never meet is the old-fashioned way of thinking about the net. Unfortunately, there are still many national projects which seem intent on providing only gatekeepered, organised content and blanking the rest.