Can I ask what you're basing that assertion on? The article makes it sound as if they were indeed referring to the internet in general: "46% said they would rather be young in a world without the internet altogether."
[1] And how is call that new video thing? TikTakToe?
But it was less stressful at the same time. The shared reality was the 6 pm news. No endless conspiracy theories.
[0] I'm not defending Coast to Coast AM; I'm noting it's interactive format.
It was a dank and dreary little studio apartment and my only companionship was an AM/FM radio. In an interesting turn of events, I experienced Hurricane Katrina solely through audio news reports. I suffered vicariously with the victims and sang along to Aaron Neville's "Louisiana 1929".
Besides a lot of NPR, Fresh Air with Terry Gross, Wait Wait -- Don't Tell Me, and Lake Wobegon, I also listened to Art Bell's show; George Noory was often substituting at that point. It was really entertaining. In fact I used to be enthralled with the supernatural stuff when I was a really little kid picking up books at swap meets. I loved UFOs and OBEs and NDEs and SHCs. The Coast to Coast sessions brought back fond memories of those carefree days.
It's like when people say they want to go back to victorian values (of society at large) and forget that pre-dates antibiotics and anaesthesia. These people regret the socialised problems of being connected, misinformation at scale, loss of agency and genuine face-to-face communication and yearn for a simpler childhood. All well and good, but there's baby/bathwater latent in this.
There was a time when it was a big series of tubes.
It gets worse in poorer countries, where ISPs made deals with Facebook (ever wondered why some Indians are not able to google? Because google costs money, facebook groups doesn't). Additionally, whole infrastructures run on WhatsApp. In those regions you'll see WhatsApp numbers on container ships, trains, harbor buildings, factories etc because it's easier than maintaining a website for that.
(Edit: see my comment about internet.org)
The younger generation only uses smartphones because parents cannot afford to pay for both a laptop and a smartphone. Ask any teacher about that, they'll easily confirm this.
The problem we're facing is the overproprietarization of the internet. What we see as an internet where we can find information and learn about things, they see misinformation, propaganda, toxic shitstorms, and distraction. Even youtube has gone to shit, what started out as a new way to access knowledge in an entertaining way its early days.
And it's not only that, you can't even point kids to a safe website that will give them only links to learn/study about topics they're interested in, because google meanwhile has fully embraced its evil side of corporate greed that even the founders knew about was morally a conflict of interest in the beginning.
A lot of countries are thinking about banning smartphones from schools for this very reason. We (as a society) built apps so morally and uncontrollably bad that we created a whole generation of kids with self-induced ADHD, and now we're wondering why we have an education and therapy crisis.
Duh.
This is absolutely wrong. FB did that in SE Asia. But in India, this led to the creation of IIRC Internet Freedom Foundation which fights for Internet freedom to this day and established a strong foundation for net neutrality . FB tried to destroy net neutrality in India and failed.
But the broader point stands. Whatsapp, Youtube, Sharechat …etc., is internet for a huge percentage of the population.
FB to this date still owns the internet.org domain, which was literally their marketing at the time. Free plans from mobile carriers had/have access to a few selected websites and not the rest of the real internet.
While I agree that the courts decided against this at some point, it was around 13+ years too late, because a generation of mobile users got hooked already.
Meta even went as far as deleting their internet.org website from the web archive, all years result in a 404 now. Interesting.
Interesting to learn. In China, mobile carriers also have similar deals with huge content providers. You can buy data plans with a discounted rate specifically for several YouTube, Netflix, and TikTok like apps.
It wasn't even successful in its own time - the ISPs that partnered with FB for internet.org at that time got submerged soon after. Absolutely nothing of that legacy remains. You will find it difficult to catch netizens in India who even remember FB's Free Basics.
There is no evidence that social media/internet/whatever use causes ADHD, it's a neurological disorder, not a psychological one. The modern internet is harmful for the attention span and mental health, but that's not the same as ADHD.
So you’re correct, it’s not peer pressure, it’s everyone pressure.
ps. I considered using em dash in this paragraph but decided against it due to LLM's using it. Made me a little bit self-conscious for a second. I am self-editing myself not to be mistaken with an AI.
Not only was it incredibly isolating but I never fully internalized how much I rely on the internet. Thinking back it had been well over a decade since I had been that disconnected. I’d been without power for 1-2 days but only truly without internet for a few hours total (often with a way to get online if I really wanted/needed to, like while flying).
I had plenty of entertainment (books and podcasts) on my phone but I kept trying to look up info on the web. I’d hear or read something, want to follow up on it, type in a google search then be brought crashing back down to the reality of no internet. “Phantom Internet Syndrome”? It really surprised me how much “background” Internet searching/etc I do which I don’t even think about.
I lasted less than 6 waking hours (went out in the evening, in the morning I called it quits) before giving up and driving to my parent’s house (which I was already planning on doing later that week. I have a full office setup there as well).
That experience was eye-opening to me. If someone asked me how often I use the Internet and/or how I’d fare without it, I probably would’ve guessed very wrong.
6Az4Mj4D•8mo ago
clipsy•8mo ago
dartharva•8mo ago
lsharkey602•8mo ago