Oh dear, what a conundrum. With the advent of the internet (commercialisation circa 1980s) and its seemingly endless well of information, our lives have changed forever. And this is where THE ARGUMENT begins.

Some say things have improved for the better, others that this is the beginning of the end. And if you can’t be bothered reading the rest of this article because the internet has shortened your concentration span (as discussed by Nick Carr in his online article ‘Is Google Making Us Stupid?’), in summary it doesn’t matter which corner you sit in because there is no turning back. Resistance is futile.

If you google ‘How much information is on the internet?’ 234,000,000 hits come up in 0.26 seconds. That’s a lot of zeroes. (In comparison, try ‘Internet information overload’ for a paltry 1,280,000 results.) Online information is ballooning at the seams like an overfed – albeit questionably nourished – sumo wrestler. And the quality of the web’s countless websites and links is, to put it mildly, heterogeneous; valuable and useful online content is girt by absolute rubbish. Want to see some examples of the latter? Try Uncyclopedia, the content-free encyclopaedia, or www.mostannoyingwebpage.com (honestly not worth your time but I know curiosity will get the better of you).

Further interesting facts about this information situation can be found at www.cartridgesave.co.uk. According to this website, it would take a single ink-jet printer 3,805 years to print everything on the internet and then you would have to spend 57,000 years (non-stop) to read through it all. Such figures are both amazing and frightening at the same time.

So why does it matter? Isn’t bigger better? Well, to put it in perspective, data gathered in the US by research firm Basex showed that information overload cost the country US$900 billion in lost productivity during 2008 – and the figure continues to rise. Tackle this issue effectively and the savings could be significant.

Ah, if only it were that simple.

Navigating the internet without getting bogged down or distracted can be hard. The signal-to-noise ratio is on an upward spiral. There’s so much stuff to surf, oops I mean, search, before you find what you are actually looking for. A number of resources are available that purport to help you take back control. Some of these cost an exorbitant amount but there is also plenty of free advice. The only thing is: who has the time to go through each of the 827,000 hits to see which ones are worth reading? I certainly don’t.

But if everybody could become just that little bit more efficient at using this ever-expanding database, the potential benefits are not hard to imagine – and they extend well beyond the office or the boardroom. People might be able to leave work on schedule, spend more time with the family, see a play, go out for dinner, read a book, bake a cake, take the dog for a walk and generally enjoy the little things in life. The human race might reconnect. Remember that?

The internet is both friend and foe, but the bottom line is it’s here to stay. So the question is do we grimace or rejoice at the information it provides? My approach? I throw my hands behind my head, lean back and enjoy the ride – especially when I’m booking a holiday with little more than a wave of my hand. I accept that I cannot and should not try to use everything on the internet, and instead appreciate what I can do with it. Finally, I repeat the following mantra: ‘viva la internet!’ If you’ve got a better idea, I’d love to hear it.

Brandy Munro is a vet turned writer at WellmarkPerspexa, with 142,000 Google hits to her name.

Where do you stand?

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