
Why the Web Won't Be Nirvana (1995) - apsec112
https://www.newsweek.com/clifford-stoll-why-web-wont-be-nirvana-185306
======
sillysaurusx
This shows how hard it is to be right about the future:

 _Visionaries see a future of telecommuting workers, interactive libraries and
multimedia classrooms. They speak of electronic town meetings and virtual
communities. Commerce and business will shift from offices and malls to
networks and modems. And the freedom of digital networks will make government
more democratic. Baloney._

Most of those came true.

 _You don 't know what to ignore and what's worth reading. Logged onto the
World Wide Web, I hunt for the date of the Battle of Trafalgar. Hundreds of
files show up, and it takes 15 minutes to unravel them—one's a biography
written by an eighth grader, the second is a computer game that doesn't work
and the third is an image of a London monument. None answers my question, and
my search is periodically interrupted by messages like, "Too many connections,
try again later."_

[https://imgur.com/0T2fBEv](https://imgur.com/0T2fBEv)

And yet.. the substance of it is so true. When everyone has a voice, it's hard
to know what to listen to. Merit tends to rise, but so does misinformation.
The weirdest part is, misinformation != lying. Most people spreading
misinformation genuinely believe it.

Stripe's founder mentioned that the internet is probably going to trend back
toward "dinner party" type apps rather than "town square" type apps: lacking
editors, people you know tend to be a reliable source of information. It's
also possible to express yourself without fearing criticism. I wonder what the
next 30 years will be like.

~~~
chrisco255
It's interesting that he wrote this as a user of the internet for 2 decades in
1995. So between 1975 and 1995, the pace of change was just not that great.
Then between say, 1995 and 2015, a lot changed indeed. Faster connections,
ubiquitous wireless internet, e-readers, fast laptops, smart phones,
e-commerce explosion, video portals and streaming, social media, etc.

It feels to me the pace of change has slowed though. Maybe that's the way
innovation goes. Sometimes in big bursts but mostly incremental.

I agree that small group conversations are probably the next wave of social
media, because you need that circle of trust to be fully expressive.

If I had to guess, I would say we will perfect VR over the next couple decades
and that we will replicate some of the brick and mortar experiences that way,
but it will still not ever quite replace in person interaction. There's always
going to be that uncanny valley between the cyber world and the real world.

~~~
kanox
The "web" generally refers to http/html which were extremely new in 1995, much
newer than generic tcp/ip networking. The first netscape navigator was
released in 1994!

~~~
airstrike
Yup. "The web" = www.* _

~~~
Ajedi32
Or rather, [http://](http://)

------
sixhobbits
Is there some kind of curated newsletter that sends out articles that are 20+
years old when predictions that they made are relevant? I'd love to read stuff
like this regularly.

------
deanCommie
It's easy to dunk on Cliff Stoll for this, but a lot of the stuff that he was
wrong about didn't really get PROPERLY solved until almost 20 years later!

The World Wide Web as we think of it today (browsers accessing websites over
HTTP) was still nascent.

SSL was only just announced 1 year earlier.

The first Kindle wouldn't show up until 12 years after.

And until the COVID pandemic most of the world still would have thought we
weren't ready to effectively telecommunicate for work full time. (Arguably a
lot of us still think that it's not sustainable long-term)

Meanwhile, the late 90's were full of big dreams and exceedingly high
expectations about what the Internet could be capable of, and the gap between
expectations and reality is what contributed to the .com crash of the early
2000's

Meanwhile, meanwhile, on a key subject which is the nature of TRUST of
information on the Internet, we've come full circle as the last 4 years have
shown that more access to better information does not guarantee a better
informed populace if powerful forces with an interest in manipulating others
have access to powerful platforms like Facebook where they can target their
misinformation to the most radicalizable group.

I would bet most people on this forum would not be able to predict accurately
the next 25 years of technological progress, and if we tried, most of us would
look as ridiculous as Cliff Stoll. His mistake was saying everything with as
much certainty as he did.

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shureluck
This gives me a pained nostalgia for a world where people liked to “hang out”
at the mall when bored.

~~~
brownbat
Futurism from forty years ago on the unbeatable triumph of malls:
[https://youtu.be/2RkxhXQnVSw](https://youtu.be/2RkxhXQnVSw)

"This is how we live now."

~~~
brabel
Interesting how in the middle of the 80's they were still talking about malls
as something novel :)

Malls made town centers decay, sometimes even disappear. Towns definitely lost
their uniqueness as pretty much every mall is the same.

I love the internet and how it allows anyone to do almost anything without
leaving home... but at the same time, I hope that spaces where people go to
physically interact do not ever disappear (at least while we're confined to a
physical, biological body, that is).

------
bmmayer1
"Every voice can be heard cheaply and instantly. The result? Every voice is
heard. The cacophany more closely resembles citizens band radio, complete with
handles, harrasment, and anonymous threats. When most everyone shouts, few
listen."

25 years ago. Wow.

------
BerislavLopac
Clarke's first law:

"When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible,
he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he
is very probably wrong."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke's_three_laws](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke's_three_laws)

------
erehweb
Previously discussed in 2013
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6835403](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6835403)
and 2018
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17585520](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17585520)

~~~
IfOnlyYouKnew
Edit: until just now, this was a comment where I mixed up 2016 and 2018 in a
way that made me look like a complete idiot.

That being too close to reality for comfort, I have removed it like some
coward who doesn't enjoy being obviously wrong.

~~~
sseagull
I know it doesn’t seem like it, but Trump was elected in 2016, and took office
in 2017. He was president when that comment was written.

~~~
libraryatnight
Seems like much much longer

~~~
sseagull
2020 feels like it has already lasted several years, so I can understand 2018
feeling like more than just 2 years ago :)

------
jfrunyon
> Yet Nicholas Negroponte, director of the MIT Media Lab, predicts that we'll
> soon buy books and newspapers straight over the Intenet. Uh, sure.

Oops.

> Then there are those pushing computers into schools. We're told that
> multimedia will make schoolwork easy and fun. Students will happily learn
> from animated characters while taught by expertly tailored software.Who
> needs teachers when you've got computer-aided education? Bah. These
> expensive toys are difficult to use in classrooms and require extensive
> teacher training.

Also oops.

~~~
tuukkah
_> > These expensive toys are difficult to use in classrooms and require
extensive teacher training._

 _> Also oops._

As far as I know, the use of computers in the classroom is still an unsolved
problem let alone all teachers knowing how to do it.

 _> > Students will happily learn from animated characters while taught by
expertly tailored software._

And thus there is no problem in closing schools for months because of
COVID-19? Watching recorded lectures and filling in multiple-choice forms does
not cut it.

~~~
indymike
There is a hockey substitution going on in education (in the Us) this year
where many teachers are leaving. The change is being driven by two factors:
fear of getting coronavirus and discomfort with teaching via internet. My wife
changed jobs and got a raise as a result.

------
the_hoser
Well... he was half-right, anyway.

~~~
TedDoesntTalk
His mistake was in criticizing reading books online, shopping, libraries, and
classrooms as if they would forever use the technology of 1995.

He did not have the vision to understand that technology would progress ...
for example, beyond the lame experience of reading a book on a giant CRT
monitor into a magical experience where I can read any book ever published,
instantly, and in the dark next to my wife while she sleeps.

------
cowmix
When I had my ISP in 1993, I gave every new customer a copy of Stoll's first
book. Great book then, great book now.

------
bickeringyokel
Reading an article from 1995 with its original typos and all. Its funny
reading someone criticising the lack of proper editing when there are a couple
obvious misspellings by the author.

------
alpineidyll3
I mean at least the title is accurate? Several of his inaccurate predictions
elicit deep wistfulness. He shoulda been right.

------
gjvc
"What is incredible and unthinkable today is pedestrian tomorrow."

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handedness
Cliff Stoll is a gem.

------
julienreszka
Skeptics always loose it's just a matter of time.

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syspec
Mark my words, in 6 months, I too, will repost this classic article and get
those sweet sweet HN points. As a bonus I will also post: "No wireless, less
space than a nomad. Lame" article

