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* CYBERSPACE *
* A biweekly column on net culture appearing *
* in the Toronto Sunday Sun *
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* Copyright 1999 Karl Mamer *
* Free for online distribution *
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Everything
Dictionary: A malevolent literary device for cramping the
growth of a language and making it hard and inelastic. This
dictionary, however, is a most useful work.
-- Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary
I have discovered a new stomping ground on the net. I thought
IRC was to become the final, impermanent resting place for my
general ranting. That is until a friend who I'll only refer to
as "Jason" passed me the everything.slashdot.org URL.
The Everything site is basically just that. Everything. The
site's creators hope to create definitions for everything that
exists, everything that can exist, and everything that can't
exist. It's an undertaking that makes the Human Genome project
look like an oil change planned for a Sunday afternoon.
The page's authors aren't doing it alone, however. Why that
would be crazy! They're allowing netizens to define basically
whatever they want and how they want. A simple hypertext system
lets users link definitions to related concepts.
While the Human Genome project will, arguably, help humanity.
The Everything project is really a clever waste of time. The
odds something productive will come out of it are slim. But
that's okay. I've long held this theory that getting productive
work out of a computer is a happy coincidence. The reason
personal computers and the net have been so successful is they
give middle-class types a chance to play like the big boys.
Computers hold out the promise that the average Joe/Josephine
can be his/her own publisher, broadcaster, film maker, or
international corporation.
Now, with Everything, you can be your own lexicographer (err,
like a dude that authors a dictionary). Okay that doesn't sound
as fun as, say, surfing for Our Lady Peace MP3s but there's
enough people wired that nearly 9000 of them have discovered
the site and defined over 60,000 terms. The Oxford English
Dictionary has 300,000 terms. With a couple hundred definitions
being added to Everything each day, the site should pass the
OED in a couple years.
The OED does not, however, have to worry about losing its
status as the recognized authority on the English language. The
OED employs teams of editors and committees to agonize over the
inclusion of a handful of really important words every year.
Facts are checked. Facts are rechecked. Words rejected because
they are deemed trendy are forwarded to Microsoft for use in
its new Encarta dictionary. The Everything site, on the other
hand, has a couple system administrators that delete a
smattering of definitions that are far too lame.
The OED will never define or even see the need to
define "University of Chicago Kicks Yale's Sorry Butt". A user
of Everything already has. And God bless him.
Accuracy, good taste, and even relevancy are secondary matters.
It's the net!
Borrowing from a Corky and the Juice Pigs song, I defined
"panda" as:
A bear native to zoos. Several have been exported to
China and introduced into the wild to control the bamboo
problem. Known for its black and white fur. The world's only
ska animal.
See. You can have lots of fun with this site. There in lies
Everything's real appeal. It's the net's equivalent of Douglas
Adams' fabled Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. The site is not
only replete with inaccuracies, they're required. Humour
emerges in many forms, including definitions that tend to be
overly accurate or overly personal and interesting choices in
hypertext linking. For example, I linked "software development"
to "pyramid schemes" and "bow hunting" to "Ted Nugent".
While most users will see an immediate connection to the five
book Hitchhiker's trilogy, many might miss its more literary
antecedent: The Devil's Dictionary. Written between 1881 and
1906 by Ambrose Bierce as a weekly column, the bound edition he
eventually published is a classic, often quoted work of parodic
lexicography (hey, I should define that on
everything.slashdot.org). The copyright expired long ago and
there are a number of hyperlinked versions on the net. A good
version can be found at www.alcyone.com/max/lit/devils/.
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* Update May 2, 2000 *
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A new and improved Everything can be found at wwww.everything2.com.
               (
geocities.com/lapetitelesson/cs)                   (
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