Actually, I tend to think that there is a rather limited range of topics that merit discussion in the framework of the Boidem, and sometimes I'm surprised that I've been able to stretch them out over three and a half years of monthly columns. The columns have on the whole dealt with social aspects of the inclusion of the internet into our lives, and as I've noted, the more that the internet becomes an integral part of those lives, the more we are able to take it for granted, the less there is to actually examine. So it's hard not to be repetitive. What's more, my opinions on these different topics haven't undergone significant change over the time I've been writing, such that once I've written about a topic, I don't really have much more to say about it.

Acting somewhat as counterpoint to that process, however, is the personal aspect of these columns. As more and more material of a personal nature has crept into these columns, the focus of attention has shifted from an objective discussion of some particular aspect of internet use, to a subjective examination of how that aspect is reflected in my life and surroundings. Though I can't promise that these subjective reports are always of interest, they create an ever increasing number of stories that can be reported and can be used as jumping off points for a discussion of the internet in our lives. Often the impetus for a particular column stems from an experience of my own with the internet, and I find that to be a fitting focal point from which my associations can branch out - associations that relate on the one hand to the larger social issues involved, and on the other to my own personal relationship to those issues. Thus I don't really feel a danger of running out of material.

Categorizing the 42 columns until December 1999 is a highly subjective process. Columns naturally overlap and deal with more than only one basic topic. Should a column that deals with addiction to the internet be classified under social aspects of the internet? Shouldn't all topics be classified under that term? The categories I have chosen aren't the only ones available, but in order to put the overall context of the Boidem into some perspective I've tried to focus on the general main topic under discussion in each column:
 

Preparing the table above was a much more difficult task than I would have expected it to be. The difficulty, for me at least (and the size of the "other" category, even after a concerted effort that placed about ten columns from there into the other categories), points to a rather broad eclecticism of the Boidem in general. That, of course, was part of the original objective - to allow me to reflect on a wide range of aspects of the internet. But until the table took shape I hadn't been aware of to what an extent I'd actually succeeded.

And yet at least one more time it bears repeating: though the topics discussed in the Boidem may interesting topics, the Boidem can't be evaluated on it content alone. True, were it to lack interesting content there would hardly be any reason to consider it at all, but similar content is available from a wide range of other sources. What causes the Boidem to be interesting (if it is) is its still relatively novel integration of hypertext into the format. Perhaps one day, not too far into the future, hypertext will have become so integrated into our culture that we will hardly notice that we are making use of it. One day, perhaps, but not yet today. Until then, we will apparently still find something novel in an even minimal use of hypertext.

Go to: For me that's not the proper metaphor, or
Go to: An introduction to the extroduction, or
Go to: Web Essays - The evolution of a (personal?) medium