Emergent patterns on the internet

One of the blogs (Dutch) I follow pointed me to a speech by Dr. Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google on the future of technology. Schmidt points out that within a few years we will carry around more video material on our iPOD’s than we will be able to view in a lifetime. We are entering the Information Age, where information is ubiquitous, omni-present. And besides the rather obvious referrals to Moore’s law (processor speed doubles every 18 months) and Kryder’s law (hard disk capacity doubles every year), he touched on a subject that is close to my heart: the power of information.

The international press was all over Hillary Clinton when it turned out she did not tell the truth about being under sniper fire in Bosnia. The interesting thing is she kept saying it over and over again, while all the information was there to prove that she was wrong. Telling untrue stories will become harder and harder, since for every fact evidence can be found on the internet. And Schmidt claims (@24 minutes): there is always someone out there who will find it.

There is a very interesting phenomenon associated with all this information. Schmidt calls it the Internet Police. Each individual is not aware that he is participating in this, but once one of them finds out a fact and starts telling his friends it will snowball and be picked up. And yes, it will directly influence something as big as the presidential campaign of the US.

All individuals together function as something new: the Internet Police. It is an emergent pattern, one of the pillars of Web 2.0 and Enterprise 2.0. I strongly believe in emergent patterns, as already stated in the article on Knowledge Management (Dutch) from 2002. I collect examples: so if you have any, please let me know!

Back to the story: will the Internet Police influence my own life? Am I not far to unimportant to be snatched up by the Internet Police? I am afraid that this pattern will be so strong not even an induhvidual like me will be able to escape. And what about our children? Their lives are on the internet from when their mothers were pregnant. How many facts and stories are being documented about them today? Will they have to change their name on their 21st birthday just to survive? What will ubiquity of information in the end mean for humanity? We will have to live and learn.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 29th, 2008 at 11:25 and is filed under Enterprise 2.0, Web 2.0, emergence, information age. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.