Written by: Dan Maas
4/8/2009 

I awoke this morning with a term in my mind that characterizes my online philosophy:  I am an Internet Forager.  Yes, I thrive on living off the natural bounty of the Internet.  I prefer to seek out online services that are free or very low cost for my enterprises.  But like foraging in the wilderness, there are some things to be careful about.  For example, if you find yourself in the mountains of Colorado, you are likely to encounter mushrooms of many shapes and colors.  And while some might look pretty appetizing, most mushrooms are chock of full of chemicals that can make you sick and even kill you... so unless you REALLY know what you are doing (I'm talking Master's Degree level of knowledge) you do NOT want to ever forage off mushrooms.

With that in mind, I began thinking about what kind of similar advice I'd offer to other Internet Foragers... a digital equivalent to "Don't eat the mushrooms!"  Here's a beginning that I know my fellow foragers can build upon:

1. Guard your personal information.  Some free services are bait to get your personal information.  Some uses are annoying like getting on emailing lists to send you spam while others want to steal money from you… or even steal your very identity and borrow money using your credit.  Remember that no matter how much money you have, your credit is always more valuable and therefore a target of thieves.
2. Use 3^rd parties for money exchanges.  If you buy something, using a reputable service to hold the money in escrow is worth a service fee.  Check these money handlers out with a Better Business Bureau search.
3. Understand how they are making their money.  Nothing is free and if something seems free, figure out why.  Sometimes the service is free because they have a premium service they want to sell you.  Others are free because they get revenue from advertisements.  And some are free because of something unsavory.
4. Watch out for piracy!  One of the biggest traps of the word “free” online is free music or other intellectual works.  Free file sharing is ok if the owner is sharing.  This is a big trend as people are adopting for a self-promotion strategy using the Internet bypassing big corporations that keep the bulk of profits and decide who gets out there.  But there are plenty of folks who rip music files off CDs and post them online.  This is piracy and you want none of that!  Some sites are designated for free distributions of music (we link to some in our training resources) that are great for class projects.
5. Learning is more than content.  MIT and others are posting their lectures and other content on the Internet for free.  This is because they understand that the value of their name is not based on content but the achievement of their students.  Putting their content online just brings more interest to their programs and serves to support the education of people who can’t make it to MIT.  No harm done and lots of good.
6. It’s out there!  A good Internet Forager knows that in most cases, by the time I’ve thought of it, someone has built it, posted it and some comments about it are on somebody’s blog.  Go look!

I’m sure there are lots of other maxims and ideas about being a safe Internet Forager so if you have some, please add here. 

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Location: Blogs Dan Maas, Ed.D. Chief Information Officer

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