I wonder what the Dean would say
If he were still around today:
“The same old old biology
Dressed up in new technology.
Example one - the World Wide Web,
That tide mark of Man's low ebb,
Designed by Mr Berners-Lee
For Physic's progress and for free
It's now a rancid pot of honey,
A noxious mix of sex and money.
It's no surprise the Internet
Has ended up as porno's pet.
It's not the garish graphic crimes
But porn sites' banging rhymes,
All 'sucks and f--ks' or 'reams and creams'
That pollute this poet's dreams.

The thing to which the Net aspires?
Pimping sellers off to buyers
While deftly slimming down your purse.
Oh Praise be to God – and Commerce.
And don't forget those IP Lawyers
Who slavish to their brute employers,
By climbing over Freedom's corpse
Make the Net safe for Megacorps.
Google, Apple, Nike and Dell
Offer us a consumerist hell.
Like all empires that grow in size
They always need to colonize
And by the worship of their Brand
Make every man their own Ireland.

I think the Net is summed up best
As an endless Partridge nest.
A never ending list of quacks
Trying to spruik their almanacs.
A dulcet choir of croaking frogs
Is what I hear when reading blogs.
All that endless folly gibber,
It's worse than reading Colly Cibber.

Searching the web for a decent site
Is panning for gold in streams of shite.
However, if I could trouble you -
Check out w.w.w
Gutenberg.org and take a look
At the latest Battle of the Book.
There a lifetime's authorship
Can be downloaded in a Zip
For most there really is no hope
but then I click on Gay or Pope.

Of course, I count my rivals' downloads
Who else still reads their windy odes?
I'm glad to see what Time has told
Is always - 'This bad verse is old.'

My last word on the Internet
Concerns its most pernicious threat:
That lazy tic 'I'll just try Google'
Makes us ever more thought-frugal.
When its tidal wave of drivel
has caused the brain to further shrivel,
and we've become so base and foul
they may as well throw in the towel.
By then, to find out what men do
you'll only ever need Yahoo.”