7-8/97
Useless information is what the Leprechauns wanted to discuss. I have learned over the years that regardless of what I want to discuss the Leprechauns are single-minded and if it’s useless information they want to talk about then it’s useless information we will discuss.
"OK," I relented, "talk to me about useless information." Mr. Scribe, who fashions himself as an expert on journalism but is quite critical of most journalists, was the first to speak up.
"Ah, O lover of Praline Pumpkin-Custard Pie, your profession is the very worst at promoting useless information. I’ll give you a very precise example. In the April edition of that American magazine called
"The survey asked ‘How often do you back up some or all of your data?’. The magazine faithfully reported that 14.5 percent said daily, 22.5 percent said weekly, etc., etc., etc. But you must surely see that this is totally useless information. Backing up data is not something that one does by numbers. If, for instance, you have added nothing new to your storage memory, then you would not back up period. But if you added something important one day, then you would back up and if the very next day you added something new, you would back up again."
Mr. Repeete, who rarely adds anything new but is good at echoing what’s already been said, added his two-cents worth. "That’s correct," he said. "Backing up is a matter of content, not time. I note that you, O lover of Sugarplum Cake, back up your data very sporadically -- usually in the middle of the night when you are having dreams of your hard drive being wiped out and losing your precious working drafts for your column."
I somewhat resented that because it let me know that I had been spied upon. Just last night I was having those bad dreams and, fearing my hard drive is about to give out, got up at 3 a.m. to back up my "data" directories. The Leprechauns apparently never sleep.
The meaning of "some estimates" and "100 percent"
Mr. Scribe scowled at Mr. Repeete as he took the stage again, saying, "I use this survey example in more ways than one. While the
"Now I ask you -- just how accurate and how responsible is this murky character named ‘some estimates’? This is totally irresponsible journalism by the newspapers and exceedingly poor dissemination of facts and figures from someone in the world of academia -- a chancellor of a university for Pete’s sake.
"Chancellor Bardo went on to say that ‘Even of those estimates are wrong by 100 percent, the available information will double only twice a year.’ So now we have useless information being discounted to generate more useless information. We have non-accredited facts being used to generate more non-accredited facts. An error of 100 percent is not going to get your from four times a year to two times a year. A 100 percent error would mean totally wrong. It just gets worse and worse. But -- to be fair to the chancellor -- he is correct that the world’s base of information is growing at a scary rate -- regardless of what that rate really is.
"So I conclude my point by saying that the useless information about backing up data that
I assured them all that their point was well taken, and that despite their not too subtle jabs at my profession, I generally agreed. But, I asked them, "What does this have to do with trends? Remember," I said, "our business is to tell readers about trends of the future." Before I could blink, the sardonic and sarcastic Mr. Scathe was all over me.
A very important trend
"Oh my, Oh my," he said, "our lover of Tuti Fruti Pudding just doesn’t get it. This is perhaps one of the most important trends we will see this year. The trend is that the Internet, along with newspapers, magazines, TV and radio, is losing what little authoritative value they once possessed. The general public is becoming agitated at factless information, at information thrown at them with no accountability or sourcing or solid citation. ‘Some estimates’ indeed. What does that tell us? Nothing reliable, I assure you.
"The Internet has turned the corner to becoming a rumor room of screeching voices in print. Shrill opinion givers who are so short of factual material they become comics on the Cyberstage. The savvy users of the Internet stay far, far away from these crying babels of misinformation. The savvy users look for facts that have authentic sourcing, authentic citations, full disclosure of where the information came from and full disclosure of all the information. If these things are lacking, then the savvy users pay absolutely no attention to it.
"And, the savvy users are growing. It used to be but a handful who understood that useless information inbreeds with and gives birth to even more useless information. But because the non-factual perpetrators of information, like many in your profession O lover of walnut stuffed dates, have so soiled the Internet and public information -- readers are becoming quite selective, quite cynical and quite judicious. And the trend is that this trend will get bigger and bigger which will, eventually, force anyone who writes something to do so with unimpeachable source and citation information. I think it’s one of the best trends to come down our pike in quite awhile."
Phrases that need translating
"If I had a television station I would sell it. All these big television network acquisitions are simply rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. The Internet is still evolving and we may be five years away but we are moving to a world where thousands of companies will become broadcasters. What you see here today are the components of that future."
[Alan Meckler, the founder and producer of Spring Internet World 97, speaking of the Internet and Meckler’s trade show.]
Translation: There’s a sucker born every minute and two to take his money. I’m ready and willing to take your money.
"For every person out there saying, 'Go to standards,' there are 500,000 people saying, 'Thank you for delivering an application that works,' "
[PointCast Chief Technology Officer Greg Hassett commenting on PointCast not using "industry standard HTML."]
Translation: We want control of our content. Industry standards cater to thieves and crooks. Thank you, but no thank you.
"We do think at some point it would make some sense to do some premium pricing around games.";
[Randy Coppersmith, AOL Studios vice president of communications talking about charging extra for games on AOL.]
Translation: We will charge extra for games. We may even charge extra to go into chat rooms. We need the money.
"We are willing to work with companies on a case-by-case basis. We would like to think people would work with us. We've been a partnership, and we're upset that people didn't contact us first, rather than going to the press."
[Wendy Goldberg, an AOL spokeswoman, commenting on fact that AOL content suppliers went public about AOL charging the $55,000 to put content into AOL.]
Translation: We need money real bad. Really, really bad. We have lots of lawsuits to settle.
