08/01/01
Search Engines
  
    Since I'm sure you know what an internet search engine is I don't think I really 
need to go into too much detail on the subject (though I don't expect you to actually 
KNOW how one works. These little babies are almost or the backbone of the internet 
than the HTML language. I mean sure, without HTML there wouldn't be any webpages to 
view. Well there would but then, Java is lame and so are pretty much all the other 
'flashy' languages that eat up bandwidth for no real reason other than to be annoying. 
Anyway, without the search Engine how would you ever find any of those webpages? Sure 
there is word of mouth (or text maybe) but chances are you'd just get stuck in some 
small circle of pages liked by you and your friends.
  
    And thus the idea of a searchable archive of webpage categories came to be. Think 
of it as the card catalogue of the internet. But of course unlike your local library 
(probably) the internet is vastly commercialized, and it is becoming more so day by 
day. Back in "the day" you could search for any subject and get lots of generally 
useless information on any number of personal webpages devoted to that topic. People 
had webpages about Noozles and Giant African Land Snails all over. It was pretty nice 
because while generally these pages were clones of eachother in every aspect, once in 
a while you could find a halfway decent original page. But then comes big bad Mr. 
Capitalist with his need to market.
  
    So now search engines are (most likely paid to be) quite biased to "dot com" 
results. Search for any general topic, and instead of getting a bunch of nice personal 
webpages on the subject full of "real world" opinions, you'l get a dozen links to dot 
com opinion pages, that are paid to think everything is great. Try finding information 
on your favorite Mega Man game and instead of a link to a fan site fill of pictures 
and art and game tips from people who played the game for more then ten minutes, you'll 
more likely get a dozen links to IG(ay)N or Gamespot.com with thier nearly identical 
reviews and or several online retailers trying to sell you a Mega Man game (your results 
may vary).
  
    I suppose maybe the whole great concept of "having your own webpage" is just 
starting to die off. I mean suppose you do get 100 links ot nice websites with little 
goodies on them, chances are these websites will have been dead for a year or more. No 
one seems to want to keep with what they started. Or maybe they realize they aren't 
going to get rich off the 'ten cents a click' ad they put on the webpage with thier 
personal photo album. Or possibly there is just a very large clut of webpages now, who 
wants to search through 500 results for the good stuff? Then there are other subjects 
one could search for I suppose besides games. Like say pornography. Tha may be a rather 
lengthy subject though for it's own article. But I'll say this, if you have to pay for 
the AVS password then your website is still not "FREE".