At the beginning of my internet studies class we learned about how the internet works and how the World Wide Web connects everyone through the internet. When learning about this, I instantly thought of the internet's version of the black market, Silk Road. When I asked my teacher about Silk Road he had no idea what I was talking about, so I did a little research on my own. I found this online article that explains everything anyone would need to know about the Silk Road marketplace. I thought it was very strange how easy it was for me to find this information. I didn't think much about Silk Road again until I heard that earlier this week the million dollar deep web marketplace was shut down. Attached is a link to an article I found about Silk Road's shut down in the L.A. Times. I think that the most interesting part of it all is that Ross William Ulbricht was a regular, 29-year old dude, and now a multimillionaire who will spend the rest of his life in prison. It makes you realize how the internet can level the playing field, so to speak. When you get on the computer no one knows who you are or where you come from. This middle-aged, white American man living in San Francisco was basically the world's largest drug lord. This, along with my previous research on Anonymous, have made me realize that there is still a lot that we're still figuring out in the World Wide Web. Amateur hackers and local computer nerds are becoming the trailblazers in discovering new ways to use the internet, and it seems that the government and it's attempted regulation can't keep up. Maybe the reason that technology and the internet's popularity have exploded so quickly in the past couple years is because for the first time the entire world is doing research and experiments with this new technology. Everyone, every mind, every group has the ability to use the World Wide Web, and because of this the possibilities in the future are virtually endless.
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