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We lost something when the catalog was overtaken by the search engine. With a catalog you could aimlessly browse and passively learn a slice of what was possib
by denimboy 6y ago
We lost something when the catalog was overtaken by the search engine. With a catalog you could aimlessly browse and passively learn a slice of what was possible and available in some space.
Of course a catalog is edited or curated which makes it biased but maybe more human editorial direction isn't such a bad thing in our current world of algorithmic optimized, SEO, echo chamber, click-bait choices.
Browse-ability allows non-focesed search and informs choices that are made at a later time from passive data gathering.
- majormajor 6y agoSearch engines aren't exactly "un-biased," they're just biased in more obtuse and often-unintentional ways. The entire field of SEO exists to make it biased in your favor. (That's not to say SEO goes away in a catalog world - it just starts looking like the old-fashioned human marketing still used for other channels that it currently sits alongside.) Influencers sit in a curious place between the two worlds. An influencer is basically an independent (but paid and buy-able) "micro-catalog" maintainer who is themselves exposed through an algorithmic platform.
- theamk 6y agoWe still have the catalogs which you can aimlessly browse, but they are called differently: forums, reddit, HN