Open letter to the Internet

Dear Internet,

Cool down those jets, turbo! You're moving too fast! You're giving people more ways than ever to use the internet for the purposes of good (and evil), but let's face it, it's a bit overwhelming. But the real problem is this: all of your services are competing for slices of me: my data, my life, my friends, my links, and my thoughts. But if I am not aware of this I may be tempted to spread myself thin, to loose track of myself, and so become overwhelmed with maintaining my identities and then disenchanted by the whole concept of contributing to the Infoverse. The misery of duplicating data is intense, but you leave me no choice when, inevitably, my friends use incompatible social networks.

Please stop trying to trick me into using just one service or another - that will never work! The reality is that I'll use a variety of online tools to describe various aspects of me. Each tool has it's own strengths and weaknesses, and that's okay.

So take care, Internet, to encourage me to have a coherent view of my online-self.

Warm regards,
Josh Rehman

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