________  ________  ________   
   2021-03-19                                   /        \/        \/    /   \  
                                               /       __/         /_       _/ 
   I started  writing  about Gemini  and the  /        _/         /         / 
recent  wave  of interest  from a circle  of  \_______/_\___/____/\___/____/_
tech/Linux  YouTubers  and the more  I wrote    /        \/        \/    /   \
the more I felt like I was getting  déjà vu.   /        _/         /_       _/
Had I written about all this before?          /-        /        _/         /
                                              \________/\________/\___/____/
   Well yes, it turns  out I had!  The  same
crowd "discovered" Gopher a couple years ago and "left the web forever".

   For the most part,  my original  comments[1]  still stand but  I wanted  to
highlight one bit in paricular;

         In that same  vein, so  frequently  these fair weather visitors
      bring nothing  to Gopher  for Gopher, often patting  themselves on
      the back for mirroring their web presence  or similar. This is, in
      my opinion, not what Gopher needs and is certainly  not a good way
      to generate long-term  interest. You might find one or two  Gopher
      users who appreciate  being able  to  access  your content without
      leaving their  comfort zone but that's preaching  to the choir. Of
      those already accessing your content via the Web, a  handful might
      check the  Gopher space  out for  the  novelty  but  not many  are
      likely to become  Gopher  converts. It helps very little to "bring
      gopher back".

   This really  nails why I get so snotty  about this gang's  new interest  in
Gemini. They're using Gemini,  ok good, but they're not contributing  anything
to growing Gemini  as its own space. Gemini as nothing but a plain-text mirror
of Web content will be forgotten, it'll be nothing  more than an experiment or
a footnote to the Web. It serves no purpose.

   And that's all I see so  far from  these tech YouTubers, the same  mirrored
Web content they posted for a few months on Gopher until they forgot about it.

   They'll forget about Gemini too, given a few months, I'm sure.

   A small afterthought  that came to me once I re-read this after  publishing
is that, as  ugly  or unpleasant  as you  may find it, objectively  the  Crunk
Gemini Textboard[2] has contributed more original, for-Gemini content than all
these TechTubers have so far. Not an endorsement, just an observation.

   Unlikely that kind of content will put Gemini on the map though haha.


[1] gopher://baud.baby/0/phlog/fs20190530.txt
[2] gemini://matrix.kiwifarms.net



EOF