The Dark Side of the Force

A mini tempest in a teacup blowing up at meme-land, over socialism versus social networks, hype, snake oil and window-dressing versus the ‘solidity’ of standards and ‘truly distributed’ networks. Bill Thompson’s article does have some element of truth in respect to the temptation of appearance over architecture, as Nicholas Carr remarks; yet, in many ways, his article and the myriad responses seem to be devolving into an argument of the “how many angels on a pinhead” kind.

Despite all the hyperbole about Web 2.0, the reality is that we still live in a largely 1.0 world. All the social networks put together still probably don’t touch more than 80% of the existing Internet userbase; and let’s not forget that over 80% of the world DOESN’T access the internet.

And even within this microcosm, the numbers of non-techies who don’t give a damn about Ajax or Achilles, dot net or dot com, far outnumber the few who might feel impelled to debate this question. For most users especially of the consumer type, the real questions are whether it’s cool, fun and easy to use, and helps them get something done; the something done being a want rather than a need.

Even over to business users, the decision is largely over whether this serves a useful purpose, how it best integrates with their existing activities, the benefit they derive versus the costs involved. Just as they wouldn’t worry whether FedEx uses a hub and spoke system or a combination of air and land transport to get their documents across on time; their only worry would be how reliable the visible performance is, and how cost effective or otherwise it would be.

And the evolution of technology, the net, and web 2.0 has been driven by what the user accepts. While passions may rise high over the domination of Microsoft and the purity of the Free Software movement, the reality remains that as long as the user perceives an advantage that he is willing to pay for, ideology will take a back seat to pragmatism. And arguments over the nitty-gritties of technology as it is today, become irrelevant as tomorrow’s advances come to light.