The New York Times published an article on Sunday about Google indexing its one trillionth website recently. The article says that as large as that number is, it’s only a fraction of what is on the web. Lots of information in databases and catalogs and all sorts of other mediums remain un-indexed at this point because search engines can’t find them. This section of the Internet is called the “Deep Web.”
Of course, Google is trying to figure out how to find and index the Deep Web so its users can benefit from these untapped resources.
In some sense, all of us are in the same battle. I can’t tell how often I’ll be having a conversation with someone or writing an article about something and I know that I must have something on my bookshelves about that very topic that would be useful, but I don’t know where to start to find it. That’s one of the reasons I’m so found of marking books as I read them. But I probably have just as many unread books on my shelves as I do read books. And its the unread books that are the problem because I don’t know exactly what is in them.
Of course, a person can never really read everything he or she wants to, so the concept of the Deep Web remains a constant in all of our lives. And not just in books.
I heard a man tell a story the other day about how he took the time to record an interview with his mother before she died. He asked her questions about her life and she provided details he may have never known, and by doing so, she provided details that future generations in his family certainly wouldn’t have known. Now he’s going to incorporate the interview onto a DVD using a program like Movie Maker. He’ll splice some of the interview into one section while pictures from his mother’s life scrolls by. Then he may put in some of his own narrative, followed by more from his mother as more pictures and videos appear.
By interviewing his mother, he accessed the Deep Web portion of his heritage and he preserved it for future generations. If he hadn’t done so, much of the information would have been inaccessible.
Just being aware of the Deep Web in life (metaphorically speaking) makes me want to do something to make sure I preserve as much of it as possible. How about you?
