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University students, individuals, special interest groups and a host of others were responsible for the small kernel of HTML-encoded content form which today's massive array of webpages grew.

These days however, there's also a massive amount of commercially produced material from news publishers, companies and corporations, etailers and the like.

Despite the growth of professionally generated content, I still think that without the non-commercial stuff, the web would be a far less useful and interesting place.

Discussion forums, blogs, personal webpages and sites such as Wikipedia are good examples of really interesting stuff created by websurfers, for websurfers.

Right now however, I'm wondering whether the average Net user should be doing more than they are.

Now have your say Got something to say about today's column, or want to see what others think?  Visit The Forums While you're here, why not visit the Aardvark Hall of Shame and perhaps make your own nomination.

Imagine how cool it might be if every household or individual with an internet connection had their own little piece of cyberspace.

Instead of just subsidising the expansion of Telecom's skinny-band DSL service into more remote areas, why doesn't the government consider subsidising an initiative to give every man, woman, child, household or whatever, their own webspace and entry in a database..

With a suitably simple user-interface, this would allow *anyone* to set up their own blog, picture gallery, personal profile or whatever -- if they wanted.

Such a system could make Telecom's directory service (and its charges) obsolete almost overnight -- while also allowing people to control exactly how much (or little) information they wanted to make public.

Looking for someone called Joe Blogs who lives in Wellington and you met last week at a conference -- but you can't remember his phone number or address?

Just search the database and browse through the pictures of those who have chosen to make their mug-shots available online.

Want to contact Joe and arrange a meeting?

Well his entry will likely provide several methods of contacting him including his mobile phone number, is instant-messaging ID, and perhaps even a contact form that is delivered by email.

Need a house-painter?

Search for house-painters in your area and check out the pictures they've posted of their handiwork. You can possibly even check out their work diary to see how long it might take before they could do your job.

Of course there are already plenty of places on the web where you can set up a webpage or join an online community and post those details about yourself that you'd like to become public -- but it's the very number of these services that makes them less useful because the information is not centralised.

Why not have a "cyberNZ" service that is designed solely to provide a single point where this information can be lodged and therefore found?

Anyone who could create such a system and convince a critical mass of people to list themselves could become very rich within a few short years. Thanks to the proliferation of WAP/Internet-enabled cellphones and the way the Net has become ubiquitous throughout business and homes, this would be one very valuable database service.

Place your bets now as to how long it takes before we see some bright young entrepreneur launch such a system...

Lighten Up
Come on folks, contributions are lagging here.

Given that the Net is probably now the most popular method for accessing porn ^H^H^H^H adult erotica, I guess it was only a matter of time before some bright spark came up with this device

And for those of you who just long to play Arne with a paintball gun, check out this baby. "I'll be black" (and blue and have a hernia from trying to lift it).

If you feel that this is a good thing and/or you hold a "geniune affection" for yours truly -- then you are welcome to gift me some money using the buttons provided. In gifting this money you accept that no goods, service or other consideration is offered, provided, accepted or anticipated in return. Just click on the button to gift whatever you can afford. NOTE: PayPal bills in US dollars so don't accidentally gift more than what you were intending :-)

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