While I was at university, I had a 
very quirky roommate. She's still one 
of my best friends. 

The day I moved in, she came into my 
room as I was unpacking and said, "I'm 
going to look through all your stuff 
when you're not here. So you can go 
through my room if you want." I was 
gobsmacked. She was unrepentant. I 
resigned myself to the inevitable.

In his most recent phlog entry, 
Solderpunk contended that phlogs are 
the great part of gopherspace and 
questioned what was special about the 
submerged 90%.[1]

So let's go back to my roommate. She 
knew that eventually, if you have a 
roommate, you snoop a little. Maybe 
you're restrained about it. Maybe 
you're not. She had no restraint 
whatsoever, so she gave me advance 
notice. But here's the thing. It was 
liberating! I actually didn't care 
what was in her room. I don't recall 
ever rifling through her stuff, but I 
didn't worry about going into her room 
if I needed something. The rules were 
established. As for her, I assume she 
knew the contents of my sock drawer 
better than I did.

Anyways, that's the great thing about 
the submerged 90% of the gopher 
iceberg (sorry for the horribly 
inappropriate metaphor, but I couldn't 
think of a gopher-based analogy, 
probably because I know nothing about 
gophers). You've opened up your rooms 
to me. I get to look into your 
interests in a different, less 
scripted way.

In a phlog, you control how you 
present yourself. You choose 
particular topics. You're probably 
reticent about some things. You get 
into ruts too. You flatten your own 
character. But your gopher hole is 
different. It's a dump for the things 
that interest you. That's why it's so 
interesting. I could pick out a few 
people's burrows and go through what's 
great about them, but that would feel 
oddly creepy. Kind of like if my 
roommate had livestreamed her forays 
through my sock drawer. So I won't.

But you should know that I'm going to 
look through your gopherhole when 
you're gone. So you can look through 
my stuff too.

[1] gopher://zaibatsu.circumlunar.space/0/%7esolderpunk/phlog/gopherspace-the-tip-is-the-best.txt