Caveat
Emptor
Advice
that costs nothing could be worth exactly what it cost.
There are
definitely times when the whole concept of the Internet scares me. The
ability to share information quickly is undoubtedly a worthy reason
to develop the World Wide Web but at the same time we have managed to
unleash a monster.
Before
the Web came along the transfer of information to the general population
relied on the traditional mediums of print, radio and television and
to a much lesser extent, the spoken word.
To get
your message across to the widest possible audience you needed to be
able to tap into one of those major mediums. That was not possible for
most people and so the information that was published usually came from
experts in the various fields.
The flow
of information may not have been as great as it is today but you could
almost guarantee what you were reading and what you were hearing was
factual and based on years of experience and research.
Over the
years we humans have been conditioned to place a great deal of weight
on what we read. If it appears in print then it must be right. It's
almost embedded in our genes.
And then
along came the Web and the ability to publish one's thoughts was suddenly
given to anyone who owns a computer and has the ability to upload files
to a web site. Now we're deluged with information, it's everywhere and
on every conceivable topic.
But how
do we know that the information that we are taking in is credible? How
do we know that the person who is presenting that information really
has any experience?
We simply
don't know that at all. We can't see the person, we can't check up on
his or her credentials. You could be about to make life changing decisions
based on information that has no real basis in fact or experience but
that must be true because you read it on an industry message board.
And just
lately I've been seeing a lot of that sort of half-baked information
put forward by people with no other credentials than a big post count.
Caveat
emptor has never applied more strongly than it does today to information
that you find on message boards. In a world of smoke and mirrors message
boards are often the worst place to look for the information you need
to run your business.
However,
if that's where you think you should look then critically analyse what
you are reading. Look at it in the light of common sense and your own
personal experiences. Look at the websites these people claim to operate,
follow the trails that people leave behind them on the web and if you
can't find one then be very cautious.
Question
everything that you read; do it openly or in your own mind because the
person whose advice you might be about to follow may have even less
of a clue than you.
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