Glut is a solid historical overview of “information management” and the varied solutions to ever-present problem of “too much information” - particularly acute today because of the Internet. But while the book’s historical documentation is solid, I thought it would present more analysis, prognostication, and solutions. Therefore, I was somewhat disappointed by its end.

Glut claims that ever since people banded together into tribes, knowledge was organized in a top-down hierarchy, or a taxonomy. Even the most technologically primitive societies organize things into family trees, meaning boar and sheep are both animals while plants are a different category, subdivided into more. This is no different than our current use of hierarchy in the organization of files and folders on a computer or web server.

The advent of writing meant an information explosion, leading to stacks of stone tablets in the first libraries. But without the means to mass produce documents, power became consolidated among the publishers. During the Dark Ages, the monasteries had control, laboriously copying documents by hand while the masses remained illiterate. Gutenberg’s printing press produced another information explosion.

The author goes so far to claim this explosion resulted in mass psychosis. The cultural upheaval of the enlightenment may today be looked on as positive, but it meant a huge increase in revolution, rebellion, witch burning, and religious condemnation. Basically, a battle between those seeking to retain control and those who wanted to destroy the controllers after the spread of information. This also applies to modern times, with old media crumbling at the hands of new, and continuing worries of Internet addiction. In the future, we may look back on the early web days as yet another period of cultural upheaval due to the freedom of information.

Glut eventually presents the history of the Internet. Some Internet pioneers wanted the network to be similar to a library, with both authors and readers having the ability to edit web pages. Other information-friendly ideas were two way links, and meaning implicit in the markup. Imagine the the Internet resembling Wikipedia.

Instead, the Internet is chaotic and nearly random - there is no over-arching taxonomy. Hence, the “search engine” has emerged as a second-best way to access to information. New gatekeepers - web designers and developers - have increased in importance. Basically, where the librarian was the historical organizational pivot, we now have technical people replacing them, who may not have any interest in the organization of knowledge as a whole. The end result is arguably, not good for the masses who could benefit from the wealth of online information.

Thankfully, Google’s mission statement could apply to a librarian: “organize the immense amount of information available on the web.” Some are thinking ahead to a “semantic web” where meaning would be layered over the existing Internet, enough so to be often included as one aspect of the nebulous “Web 3.0.”

After reading Glut I felt that while we have definitely made the dissemination and reproduction of information faster than ever imagined, the organization is as woefully lacking as ever before. The amount of information has increased exponentially, leaving us with more need for information technology than ever before. In its absence, people complain of “information overload.”

In conclusion, Glut was a interesting book if you like history. Although its analysis came up a bit short. I’m glad I read it.

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