Re-Organizing the World’s Information: Why we need more Boutique Search Engines
For most queries, Google search is pretty underwhelming these days. Google is great at answering questions with an objective answer, like “# of billionaires in the world” or “What is the population of Iceland”. It’s pretty bad at answering questions that require judgment and context like “What do NFT collectors think about NFTs?”. The evidence is everywhere. These days, I find myself suppressing the garbage Internet by searching on Google for “Substack + future of learning” to find the best t...
Re-Organizing the World’s Information: Why we need more Boutique Search Engines
For most queries, Google search is pretty underwhelming these days. Google is great at answering questions with an objective answer, like “# of billionaires in the world” or “What is the population of Iceland”. It’s pretty bad at answering questions that require judgment and context like “What do NFT collectors think about NFTs?”. The evidence is everywhere. These days, I find myself suppressing the garbage Internet by searching on Google for “Substack + future of learning” to find the best t...
From Winner Take All to Win and Help Win: the Original Vision of the Internet is Making a Comeback
A collaboration between Sari Azout and Jad Esber This is a VERY special essay. Read through the end to find out why. Token #30751 From the internet’s beginnings, we were promised that it would be the great equalizer. Analysts and tech prophets of the early 2000s wrote think pieces about how tech would transform the power dynamics of modern life and erode the hierarchies of society. But the bright-eyed optimism of the early 2000s has been almost universally replaced by a techno-dread, a feelin...
From Winner Take All to Win and Help Win: the Original Vision of the Internet is Making a Comeback
A collaboration between Sari Azout and Jad Esber This is a VERY special essay. Read through the end to find out why. Token #30751 From the internet’s beginnings, we were promised that it would be the great equalizer. Analysts and tech prophets of the early 2000s wrote think pieces about how tech would transform the power dynamics of modern life and erode the hierarchies of society. But the bright-eyed optimism of the early 2000s has been almost universally replaced by a techno-dread, a feelin...
