The post-social crash web has left me thinking about services on the Internet. As we've seen with the social crash, the most powerful things on the Internet won't last forever. It's practically a guarantee that no matter how powerful something is, it still has to pay the price of time.
This leaves me to wonder several things. Will the services I use right now be around for much longer at all? What will casual users of the web do? How will we all adapt to this crash?
I think the obvious solution is to do what you said, Ev. In regards to the services, we just need to spread ourselves out. Nothing will be around forever, so we need to have some sort of virtual safety net, without allowing it to tie us down. It's a hard thing to do, but if we focus ourselves and connect with technology more deeply, over time, it will happen.
I'm worried about the casual users, however. What will they do if they don't know that these services won't be around forever? They can't know, really. It's our job to inform them that things are rapidly changing, which requires rapid evolvement.
evolving.
I think the adaptation to this will be easy. It will be painful, but it will be fast. As long as we inform those who don't know about the crash, everything will be okay. Humans have become used to evolving through technology, so once we accept the fact that a change needs to be made, we'll refocus ourselves and make the change.
On the topic of designing for the post-social crash web, things need to be simple. Design does matter, but it needs to be simple enough to stay out of the way. The focus should be on the content. We need to focus on writing true work that helps others, not add more noise to the already insane pile of crap.
Your question has inspired me to write
*Note: I've written about this topic more in depth on my own [blog][1], Ev. I'll be doing this later today.
blog. You can find the focused entry [here][1].*
[1]: http://calebstewart.nethttp://bit.ly/l3fXsu
