I just went back through the old posts on this site to take advantage of Redcloth and fix up some broken links. I noticed an interesting point in doing so. I noticed how much of my own, personally identifiable information is on this site. I used to think this kind of thing was entirely bad, evil, and scary. Recently, though, I’ve been rethinking this stance because of what I see happening on the internet in general.

First, I feel as though the internet is missing a way to connect real people to real ideas. The internet is a fog of mostly anonymous, reactionary comments. Trying to understand the many incentives behind such comments is as mathematically complex as economics. Well, actually, it’s just sociology so…

Secondly, we can use sociology to understand some basic principles of how we should act on the internet. This goes further then basic netiquette and starts to head towards how societies thrive, communicate, and decide which direction to head in the future.

Thirdly, to be able to take part in any conversation involving the internet, we need to have a public presence on the internet. If we do not, our ideas will not be taken as seriously because we will be viewed as an “outsider”. We will not be seen as “vetted” by the rest of the internet based society.

Now, this isn’t a plea for everyone on earth to have a public internet presence because we’ve already seen that monster. And, while it may have cause some things to get a little better, such systems of “Internet Presence for All” fundamentally missed the first point I made. Too much friggin’ noise from too many unfocused individuals.

So, with these ideas in mind, I had to ask myself, “How the hell is this site, or even this post, any different from the pre-existing paradigms of internet presence that I’ve been so used to in the past?”

And I think the answer has to be something along the lines of, “I built this myself, I share myself and my ideas here, and, if anyone asks, they’ll know where to find me for further discussion.”

After all, communication is useless if you don’t know who or what you’re communicating with.