When today’s data goldmines becomes tomorrow’s data carcasses In
1859 the tiny community of Tin Cup, Colorado got its first taste
of gold fever. A tiny amount of gold was all it took for
prospectors to start poking around with hopes of striking it
rich. Twenty years later they landed their first major strike
and rumors of the find spread across the country. By 1900, the
once insignificant mountain settlement had mushroomed into a
bustling gold town with over 2,000 people. But in a short time
the mines were exhausted, the people left, and the post office
closed its doors in 1918. Today, the only remnants of this once
thriving community are a few abandon buildings and a couple
signs along the road. Ghost towns are a rich part of world
history. There are literally thousands of examples of these now-
irrelevant pin pricks on a map. Overnight sensations quickly
became a distant memory in the years that followed. Is the
Internet today really that much different than the gold rush
stories of the late 1800s?