Changing mindsets
That it would take nearly two decades before mainstream media could muster courage to link outside their domain may seem ridiculous. But that’s exactly what happened. While reading this article in The New York Times, I was reminded about this following eloquent quotation:
People running Internet systems had to let their computer be used for forwarding other people’s packets, and connecting new applications they had no control over. People making web sites sometimes tried to legally prevent others from linking into the site, as they wanted complete control of the user experience, and they would not link out as they did not want people to escape. Until after a few months they realized how the web works. And the re-use kicked in. And the payoff started blowing people’s minds.
Letting your data connect to other people’s data is a bit about letting go in that sense. It is still not about giving to people data which they don’t have a right to. It is about letting it be connected to data from peer sites. It is about letting it be joined to data from other applications.
It is about getting excited about connections, rather than nervous.
Media companies have long perceived their online versions as true reflections of their newspapers. Links became casualties of that belief, thereby denying readers the pleasure of links—as acknowledgements, attributions, references, and as trusted sources.
So this latest news about mainstream media now beginning to understand the power of links can only be good.
Yet, outside of technology and media focused companies, if you have noticed, a majority of establishments are still in dark ages—when it comes to linking. They fear the links. They are still trying to better understand the “new media,” as I often hear. A link is somehow ill-conceived as an entity requiring legal cleansing—a hassle they would much avoid.
I guess they’ll never know until they try. Because this unique ecosystem that we know as the internet is, well, unique; and way too cool to be in shadows and dust of ancient and dated publishing philosophies. It is also time to get over the idea of links as some kind of currency, especially in terms of acknowledging, and extending ideas. Sir Isaac Newton said it best when he said, “If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.”