Characteristics of the Internet that are not been told normally

Many people talk about convenience of the Internet first. But how much have you thought about the other side? I listed the characteristics of the Internet that are not usually told.

More than 10 years have passed since the Internet became necessary in our life. It has been told that the Internet changes the system of society, but I think this kind of topics ware settled down. I am a user of the Internet since 1996, and had concerned about one thing since then. That became truth.

The concerning was old information and new information mix up. The first page I made was an article about a ramen restaurant nearby. No one can guarantee how long the restaurant exists. The menu and prices may change too. Not only that. Even I, the creator of the page, may forget the existence of the page because there was no CMS at that time. I had to manage pages by myself by checking if the file exists or by making a list of pages.

This is not only what I concerned. I found the article stays forever. One idea came up to my mind when I was making a home page. “How long does this home page exist?” You don’t need to define the expiration date when you create a page. Well, you can say the pages exist until you stop paying for your provider, since you need a contract with them to publicize your pages. This means, on the other hand, your pages don’t disappear unless you have a contract.

Let’s think about the definitions of the Internet and home pages. There is only one definition of the Internet – the network that computers all over the world are connected to. The beginning of the Internet was a network called ARPANET which is constructed by American military. Then, computers keep connecting to the network by using physical cables. Because the network spread like a nest of a spider, it is called a web.
A home page is a page which is on the Internet and shown first. In difficult terms, the homepage of Wikipedia is data that is responded from www.wikipedia.org to your request / (slash) on port 80 by using the HTTP protocol.

Incorrect use of words is well seen. “Doing the Internet.” is not correct. What I want to say is that we need to interpret the definition of those words correctly. I misuse words too. I misuse words because I misunderstand. I misuse words intentionally for other people to understand. I misuse the word “Internet” right after this paragraph, but please pay attention to my words and think if you understand correctly as you read.

And terms like “these years”, or “recently” are based on the date when I create each blog post.

So, many people talk about convenience of the Internet first. But how much have you thought about it? I listed the characteristics of the Internet that are not usually told.

• Only creator can modify or delete the page. (If the page is　inconvenient to you, there is nothing you can do.)
• You cannot tell when the page was created.
• You cannot tell if the page is true.
• You cannot tell who the author is.
• You cannot tell how long you can see that page. (The page might disappear suddenly!)
• Your information is send to the author.
• You cannot delete that information.
• There are possibilities that the author leaks or loses that information.
• What he shows depends on the author. (The author can show the page only to you or beside you. The author can show only the part or the entire page. Whatever.)

These are not applied to all the home pages. I listed just “general examples”. But I don’t think these are well-known to public. People who have considered the Internet as the existence that is friendly and offers you lots of information for free, read carefully. You are offering information too! In addition, you can’t delete it on your own. The information is theirs from the moment you access. I listed only characteristics that are “good” home pages. On the other hand, the “bad” home pages are something that use bad techniques. I didn’t list “bad faith” from the third person.

“Your information” is every data sent from your browser to the destination computer. It is not only something you intend. For example, banking and shopping transactions are what you intend. (If not, that would be a problem!) The information that you would not intend to send is your IP address, the name of your browser, and cookies… what I call the data your browser send “for master”.

If you are interested in this post, following posts may be helpful.

• Let’s chose information and verify it
  As the Internet spread and individual people can send messages, how many people verify the information they receive?
• Let’s know that we know nothing
  What do you think if you are asked “Is august hot or cold?” We don’t know that we know nothing. Therefore we assume, fear and decide good or bad.
• “DO NOT MIX” – Label is just a part of truth
  Manufactures may warn what they think danger, but they don’t always consider users to judge how danger the product is, or they don’t always warn what they have to.

This post is also available in: Japanese