RIP Comments

Things Keep Changin' 'Round Here

The web may have narrowly avoided disaster last week when the EU Parliament threw out a terrible copyright law that could have crushed the internet (and memes!) as we know it, but that doesn't mean that the pace of change has slowed in the digital wilds. Two seemingly smaller stories broke last week that certainly don't signal the end of the world, but do symbolize a sea change.

Web 2.0 vs. Web 1.0

The first of these stories came in the form of Netflix removing online reviews from its platform. At one time it was possible for users to get creative with their thoughts about what they watched on the platform, but those days are coming to an end. Reviews have never been visible outside their desktop experience, and even those have been deprecated, first for stars, and then for simple thumbs up or down. Soon, reviews will disappear altogether.

Then, not long after, ESPN announced that it was removing comments from its site as well. I'm sure that avid fans of the network have seen this coming-- I've heard rumors that the company doesn't even really respond to emails, instead shunting customers to social media to get in touch. And while the loss of the comment section means little to me personally, it does seem to signal the end of an era.

ouch

What I believe we're seeing in the two examples above are the dying breaths of Web 1.0. Before the rise of social media (one of the most successful darlings of Web 2.0), users were far more passively engaged in the web. The only way someone would be producing web content in those days were if they worked for a company like ESPN with a web presence, or if they were a big 'ole tech nerd (not unlike those of us here on Steemit, piloting new technologies and methods for the heck of it).

But then came social media, and now everyone and their mother is a content creator. And now that social's become so pervasive, big sites like Netflix and ESPN are surrendering their own interactive walled gardens to the supremacy of The Big Five tech monopolies(article is paywalled).

A literal picture of social media feasting on the greater internet

Distributed No Longer

One of my favorite advantages of the internet is its distributed nature. Similar to the blockchain, the importance of any one server, site, or user is relatively marginal compared to the importance of the network as a whole, which has a whole host of benefits, from accessibility to sustainability to competition and innovation and more.

But what happens when some parts of the internet become so popular that they capture entire populations and functions, in much the same way that social media appears to be consuming other interactive parts of the web? In addition to things like the Cambridge Analytica scandal and other breaches of user trust and data. And if this trend of consolidation and closure continues, who knows what Web 3.0 will look like

gpoy