On the Soapbox

It is January 19. A year ago, I launched this 7th incarnation of my website. This new year will also be my website's 10th year; before 2007 is over, I shall be able to say that I've had a home on the web for a decade.

The first four versions of my website came and went within the first year. On my website's first birthday in 1998, I launched the fifth version. Things slowed dramatically after that; the sixth version of my website was launched years later in 2002, and it would be years after that before the current seventh version came into being. This is not too unlike the browser world, where release cycles that used to be measured in months have now morphed into ones measured in years. Or for that matter, much of the Internet itself. People often remark about how much and how fast the Internet is changing, but it seems to me that things have slowed dramatically, especially compared with the rate of change in the 90's. People and technology have found and settled into their grooves--their steady state equilibria, if you will--and the world of computing is developing a comfortable inertia. Anyway, it would be interesting to see how many years it would be before I do another redesign and technical overhaul of this website; personally, I wouldn't hold my breath.