Teh internets: virtual compulsive hoarding?

Something occurred to me. Turns out the internet is not a huge repository for the sum of all human knowledge. It is in fact the final frontier for a world that has been taken over by compulsive hoarders.

From Wikipedia (which may be the ultimate compulsive hoarder):

While there is no definition of compulsive hoarding in accepted diagnostic criteria... Frost and Hartl (1996) provide the following defining features:

the acquisition of, and failure to discard, a large number of possessions that appear to be useless or of limited value. [Ed's note: see everything on the internet ever]

living spaces sufficiently cluttered so as to preclude activities for which those spaces were designed. [Ed's note: see every web page ever]

significant distress or impairment in functioning caused by the hoarding. [Ed's note: see flame wars]

Reluctance or inability to return borrowed items. As boundaries blur, impulsive acquisitiveness could sometimes lead to kleptomania or stealing. [Ed's note: see all discussions relating to "copyfighting", pace Cory Doctorow]

The hoarder may mistakenly believe that the hoarded items are very valuable, or the hoarder may know that they are useless. A hoarder of the first kind may show off a cutlery set claiming it to be made of silver and mother-of-pearl, disregarding the fact that the packaging clearly states the cutlery is made of steel and plastic. A hoarder of the second type may have a fridge filled with food items that expired months ago without ever eating them, but would vehemently resist any attempts from relatives to dispose of the unusable food items.

So, basically, that covers more or less everything from blogs to rickrolling.

Does it matter? Not really. But if anyone finds a copy of Fantastic Four #48 (March 1966) where the Silver Surfer first appears, it's totally mine dude.







The pic with the blue bag is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 - License; the one with the chartreuse phone is from http://www.messiemother.com/ via Wikimedia Commons and is by Thomas Haemmerli; the top one is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 License.