Happy 20th anniversary, Gmail. I’m sorry I’m leaving you

THERE is no end of theories for why the Internet feels so crummy these days. The New Yorker blames the shift to algorithmic feeds. Wired blames a cycle in which companies cease serving their users and begin monetising them. The MIT Technology Review blames ad-based business models. The Verge blames search engines. I agree with all these arguments. But here’s another: Our digital lives have become one shame closet after another.

A shame closet is that spot in your home where you cram the stuff that has nowhere else to go. It doesn’t have to be a closet. It can be a garage or a room or a chest of drawers or all of them at once. Whatever the space, it is defined by the absence of choices about what goes into it. There are things you need in there. There are things you will never need in there. But as the shame closet grows, the task of excavation or organisation becomes too daunting to contemplate.

The shame closet era of the Internet had a beginning. It was 20 years ago last Monday (Apr 1) that Google unveiled Gmail. If you were not an Internet user back then, it is hard to describe the astonishment that greeted Google’s announcement. Inboxes routinely topped out at 15 megabytes. Google was offering a free gigabyte, dozens and dozens of times more. Everyone wanted in. But you had to be invited. I remember jockeying for one of those early invites. I remember the thrill of finding one. I felt lucky. I felt chosen.