onfocus

"My personal information, my finances, my family connections, my ideas--all are now in the hands of those to whom I have submitted." (Can we please centralize and scale Paul Ford?)

We set up a gopher server at MetaFilter. Because, that's why!

A really nice article about the MetaFilter secret santa tradition. "In an era when our Internet friends are largely our Facebook friends...it can feel rare to connect authentically with an online stranger..."

A thousand times yes.

Some concerns about The Media embracing Facebook Instant. With the kicker, "So what happens when Facebook goes away?"

A good reminder that the Web is made of people. (This has a nice mention of the early days of MetaFilter meetups.)

Dang, we ended up with a top-down Internet anyway. "Today, Google and a handful of other major Internet corporations like Facebook, Twitter, and Amazon fulfill much the same role that Otlet envisioned for the Mundaneum—channeling the world’s intellectual output." [via RF]

This article tells some stories about MetaFilter at its best. "People connect to each other here, is what I’m saying. They get to know each other and they treat each other well."

"This is an era of networked wealth, going to scale, first mover advantage, positive feedback loops, virtuous cycles, high concentration, and high disparity. These are some of the intolerable conditions of the time we call (with subversive hope) Late Capitalism." [via anil]

"[Technical separation] lets the trolls and the normal society stay safe, but it also prevents those two from ever running into each other, from ever having that chance to understand each other. I don’t know how to let the trolls and straights run into each other in a productive way, but it’s one more thing we should think about."

I enjoy Today in Tabs and I'm not a 20-something New York media insider. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ All I'm saying is: where's my article?

by Hiroshi Yoshida.

Looking at Instagram and social media though Berger's Ways of Seeing.

I think this piece automatically makes Paul Ford our national neologizaureate.