
How to Avoid Information Overload
In all honestly I can’t say that I was one of them, but for those people in this world whose foresight had them seeing the full potential of the internet, they should be lauded for championing what eventually led to all the free information we have access to today. I mean can you think of a single day when you went the entire day without using the internet in some or other way? This includes drawing on information you might have got off of the internet earlier on and isn’t necessarily exclusive to the act of connecting to search for that information in the moment.
I might perhaps be one of them as well, but I do indeed know some people who literally over a span of the past ten years have spent more time online that “off line”.
For all that the internet brings us however, it’s definitely not without its many drawbacks and there are plenty to speak of. I don’t have to mention just how easily kids can get exposed to unsavoury content that is perhaps potentially damaging for their young, sensitive and developing minds. That’s a discussion for another day however, along with how there’s an equal and perhaps even a greater force at play working against those of us who are trying to protect the kids from some of the content which they shouldn’t be getting exposed to.
In this post my focus in more on how to avoid the information overload, which is a very real issue for those of us who value our time and want to gain some real value out of each session we spend online. Look, I enjoy the occasional cat video just as much as the next person, but you know we have some problems we need to address when the Google search results you get on the first page are either entertainment based or visibly SEO-boosted marketing materials. Yes, sometimes you are searching specifically for a product or service, or even for some online entertainment, but it becomes a problem when you’re specifically looking for some contextual and valuable information and you have to scroll 50-page-results deep to start to find the value you’re looking for.
This is when you have to take back ownership of the internet through your own little efforts. In my case that effort is this blog through which I publish information which I deem to be useful and think people might gain value out of reading, including myself. There’s a lot you don’t see which forms part of my blog, such as how Johnston Law Firm in Portland, OR makes up part of my personal list of recommended service providers which I’m happy to share with those readers who ask for such specific information.
It’s basically like taking it back to the days when Google wasn’t necessarily everybody’s home page, but rather a home page of bookmarks and RSS feeds to show you more of what you want and need to see as opposed to what advertisers hope you might want to see so that you can buy their stuff.