When people talk of the disruptive power of the Internet, they talk about disintermediation, allowing people to connect with people or entities without a third party. That is, of course, one of the powers of Twitter, where you can serendipitously interact with folks who you wouldn’t otherwise talk. (Also, it’s the dark side of Twitter in the case of harassment and abuse.)

Twitter’s algorithmic feed is reintermediation, placing its machine-learning based judgments between me and people I’ve chosen to follow and listen to. I can understand the economics - being a necessary third party can be a good little business - and I’m sure there are people who would prefer a curated feed to the raw firehose. But that’s not why I value Twitter.

Of course, this is the sort of tension that’s played out time and time again since the first Eternal September, new people, new rules, new customs, new norms of behavior. Somehow, those of us who actually witnessed the Eternal September, are still here.