Internet Universe Becoming Land Of Gated Communities

from the fences-everywhere dept

The internet used to be such a wide open space. Now, there are fences and walled gardens everywhere you look. USA Today (via AP) has an article looking at all the different types of fences, both reasonable and unreasonable, showing up on the web today. There are proprietary services, there are content filters that block certain sites, and there are firewalls that make it impossible to do certain things. All of this is to be expected as the internet "grows up" (isn't there a Far Side cartoon about this?). However, some of the fences and filters are potentially troublesome. None of this is new or surprising, but the article is a good overall summary of how different the internet is these days.