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The universe is much bigger than the internet and reference encyclopedias are still useful and popular.



You are talking about our knowledge of the universe. Our knowledge of the universe is a lot smaller than the entire contents of the Internet (sad, but ultimately true).

There is a reason why directories died and search took their place. Directories, in the form we know them, do not scale. There are far more people who would work to fill them with junk than there are people who would work to create order from chaos.

And then there's the question of how you remain objective.

And isn't Wikipedia really the answer to what you want? If you want a directory of ... well, not the Internet, but at least of our knowledge? It may not primarily be a link farm, but it usually provides a good starting point for most topics.


Wikipedia fails to link to a lot great in-depth sources of content that don't provide useful encyclopedia citations. For example, great forums on a particular topic that is not a provider of any coated fact.


If directories are really useful and people want/need them, why has the Open Directory Project stranded? Why doesn't anyone use it? Why doesn't anyone talk about it? And if people do not like that particular project, why has there been no spinoffs, no copycats, no startups to do Directory 2.0?

It is right here: http://www.dmoz.org/ and unfortunately it is a ghetto.

Wikipedia might not work as a direct replacement for directory services, but when it comes to helping you acquire knowledge, I think it does a better job. Even when the articles you find are sparse because they might help you formulate better queries to stuff into The Google.




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