Therefore they never tell anyone, and that knowledge can quite possibly die with them if it is never published in a wide manner. Example: Damascus steel was famous, for hundreds of years, but the knowledge of how to make this steel was so narrowly known that all those who knew that technique died without passing it on, and it was a truly long time before computer simulations finally managed to recreate Damascus steel after all those centuries when a person had to buy an antique to get any.
Some other Shakespeare professors believe that the way a person should act to be a great Shakespeare professor is to teach as many people as possible about Shakespeare in as complete a manner as they want to learn.
The Internet is balancing on this same dichotomy now….
Do we want Unlimited Distribution…
Or do we want to continue with Limited Distribution?
The French have just given us one of the great examples: a month or so ago [I am writing this in early February.] they found a cave containing the oldest known paintings, twice as old as any previously discovered, and after the initial month of photographing them in secret, placed an electronic set of photographs on the Internet for all of us to have. . .ALL!
This is in GREAT contradistinction to the way things had been done around the time I was born, when the "Dead Sea Scrolls" were discovered, and none of you ever saw them, or any real description of them, until a few years ago— in case you are wondering when, I was born in 1947; this is being published on my 48th birthday when I officially become "old." [As a mathematician, I don't cheat, and I admit that if you divide a 72 year lifespan into equals, you only get 24 years to be young, 24 years to be middle aged, and 24 years to be old. . .after that you have the odds beaten. If you divide the US into young and old, a person has to be considered "old" at 34, since 33 is the median age [meaning half the people are younger than 33, and half the people are older. The median Internet age? 26. Median Web age 31. Some predictions indicate these will decrease until the median Internet age is 15.
Who will rule the Internet?
Will it be the Internet Aristocrats…
or an Internet Everyman?