---------------------------------------- What makes gopher special March 05th, 2018 ---------------------------------------- First an apology is due to ckeen [0] who I didn't realize was all over this gopher thing. He was even kind enough to link to burrow in a recent phlog. Thanks to jynx for referencing him so I could discover what I was missing. ckeen recently wrote [1] about what makes gopher special to him. He and jynx [2] nail it pretty well when they talk about the simplicity, creator/consumer dynamic, and signal to noise ratio. I like the intentionality of it all as well. You don't just accidentally create a gopher hole. You didn't just click a link to oAuth somewhere and start posting nonsense. You chose to create an account somewhere that offered a gopher server, or you rolled your own. You sat there with the text editor crafting your message. It's simple, yes, but it's also much more complicated. In a sense, the technology itself and its relatively esoteric and retro nature create a sort of gatekeeper. Gatekeeping is generally used in a negative conotation these days, but I think this type of natural systems gatekeeping is different. It's not prejudiced against a people or person for identity, but for intent, will, and interest. The technology hurdles aren't that high to say you have to be a coder to make it work. Cat [3], for instance, has one of the prettiest gopher holes and he does everything by hand using the simplest tools. In place of fancy coding proficiency he has demonstrated excellent interest and will to build Fax Sex. I love nerdy communities when they're seething with excitement and intention. I hate nerdy communities when they're filled with criticism, angst, and envy. Gopher satisifes the first group well and avoids the second. Perhaps it is as jynx says, a side effect of no comments. Perhaps it's just the community by chance. Maybe it's a side effect of the manual execution? You can't do a drive-by trolling on gopher, after all. Once you sink in the time to get set up, you're part of things. At the end of the day, I guess it all boils down to content. There's a lot of people on here that are doing interesting things. Sometimes it's computer related and sometimes not, but that exceptional drive to "do" things is contagious and I love it. (DIR) [0] ckeen's gopher hole (TXT) [1] ckeen - What makes gopher special for me (TXT) [2] jynx - On the specialness of gopher (DIR) [3] Fax Sex (cat)