• rational_lib@lemmy.world
    11·
    16 hours ago

    One could argue it did work, just a little too well. In 1995 forget trans rights, gay marriage was just starting to become a question and about half of white people were still against interracial marriage. As the one atheist kid in that era, I was certainly an outlier and society still regarded it as a default that everyone was religious. Basically only black people were worried about whether police were beating people up too much and for the vast majority the only question was why we weren’t being harsher on criminals. Society’s views on things have changed very rapidly as a result of being able to access information very easily.

    I think what we’re seeing today is not a result of the internet, but a reaction to the result of the internet. Things have changed too fast for some and there’s basically a cultural luddite movement.

  • MisterFrog@lemmy.world
    4·
    16 hours ago

    The “This machine kills fascists” sticker that John Green put on his laptop for his Crash Course World History series has not aged well at all

  • 🇰 🌀 🇱 🇦 🇳 🇦 🇰 🇮 English
    6·
    18 hours ago

    Grunge music being described as “wacky” is the wackiest thing here.

    Also: David Bowie foresaw the internet’s negative effect way back in 1999 like a god damn prophet.

  • postmateDumbass@lemmy.world
    52·
    1 day ago

    There was a window where the internet was a huge positive.

    That ended 10 to 15 years ago.

    Kinda coinciding with social media apps.

    • ameancow@lemmy.worldEnglish
      19·
      23 hours ago

      It’s almost like corporations took over the internet, monetized it, and deployed every possible tool to convert it into an addicting advertising platform without any regulations or standards, driving up social contention, misinformation and propaganda because the more rage you can instill in the population the more “engagement” everything will get.

    • gandalf_der_12te@discuss.tchncs.de
      111·
      21 hours ago

      Smartphones were a bad idea. Social Media got large swaths of the population addicted to screens, increasing insomnia and anxiety. Unhealthy fads like the “girls pushing each other into eating disorders” and the whole “men are all bad” mainly spread through social media. The benefits of communication and knowledge-gathering/-spreading could have also been achieved with stationary devices. It claims to “connect” people, but made them lonelier. The loneliness pandemic is real.

      The internet and commercial computer technology should have stopped developing before 2008. Since then, it’s just adding to the enshittification. The newest bloatware is AI and the claim that it could “replace human workers”. What’s next? When will be abandon commercial computing technology for free and open source alternatives?

      • LittleBorat3@lemmy.world
        2·
        8 hours ago

        I mean it has to make some money at some point and that makes it a matter of time until enshittification starts.

        If your social media site does not need to make any money, it can also be unskewed in information, not sell your data not advertise etc.

        No interest in keeping you engaged. That was maybe the driver algorithm that fucked up modern life.

      • abbotsbury@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1·
        18 hours ago

        Even moot has said it’s the smartphones, internet access in your pocket is just a recipe for disaster

    • Num10ck@lemmy.worldEnglish
      29·
      1 day ago

      thats when the MBAs took over from the nerds because there was way too much money, and somehow not enough.

      • underwire212@lemm.ee
        15·
        1 day ago

        Remember the days when the CEO of tech/manufacturing was actually an engineer or PhD researcher. Not many companies have that nowadays.

        • Num10ck@lemmy.worldEnglish
          8·
          1 day ago

          supposedly it goes in long cycles. during boom times, sales/marketing take over to squeeze out profits and market share. during bust times, development/engineering takes over to evolve the offerings. we just had a really long boom cycle and it appears to be finally busting.

  • LovableSidekick@lemmy.worldEnglish
    5·
    20 hours ago

    Oh that’s right, in the Internet’s early days people thought it would do what they also thought television would do in its early days. But then the Internet did the same things television did - became an advertising platform and and dumbed down its addicted users. Maybe when the next communications breakthrough comes we’ll realize… lol nah of course we won’t.

    • liv@lemmy.nz
      1·
      8 hours ago

      One of the first people to see the potential of television in its early days was actually Adolf Hitler. He hoped that one day there would be one in every town. And now the internet is doing what he hoped television would do.

  • Vespair@lemm.ee
    261·
    1 day ago

    I mean, the internet went to shit when we all centralized around enormous corporate gatekeepers like Facebook and Twitter instead of the personal websites of yore, so I feel like that sentiment still tracks

    • Spaniard@lemmy.worldEnglish
      18·
      1 day ago

      Many things contributed to the downfall of internet.

      • Corporations: not much to say about it. All they want is more users and all they want is more money.

      • Ads: because everyone wants money. I am making a tutorial? I want people watching it to give me money. I am making a website? Money. I have free time I can watch some ads to earn money! Then corporations go in the middle: That guy is making tutorial I can put ads in it, give him a small fee and the rest for me!

      • Centralization: as you said, instead of millions of forums people just go to reddit.

      • Privacy: People not only don’t care about it, they are willingly giving it away for free, and the big corporations profit.

      The selfhosting movement is the light in the tunnel, but it’s really dangerous out there and good actions can bring bad people and they can absolutely ruin your setup.

    • TheKingBee@lemmy.worldEnglish
      12·
      20 hours ago

      Personal websites didn’t die because of social media, the simple fact is no one wants to run their own server… I run my own server and can tell you it’s a money sink much like a boat.

    • lightnsfw@reddthat.com
      81·
      21 hours ago

      Yea, I remember when everyone thought putting your personal info on the internet would get you murdered. Then MySpace came out and everyone quickly forgot all that.

  • gandalf_der_12te@discuss.tchncs.de
    41·
    21 hours ago

    Yeah the internet was actually a tool developed by the US to spread propaganda and brain-wash people abroad democracy and freedom of expression (slight /s)

  • HubertManne@moist.catsweat.com
    191·
    1 day ago

    The internet felt like the beginings for a star trek utopia. All the worlds knowledge for all to access. Never really thought about it being sectioned off and limited for anything of quality and then being loaded with crap to sift through. Never thought that it could be filled with propoganda and be used to control whole sections of the populace.

  • Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world
    106·
    2 days ago

    My mom almost bought me a tamagachi in the 90s. I say almost because what she actually bought me was a cheap knock off.

    What I remember most about it was my friend showed me their tamagachi, and it’s born as an egg.

    Then I remember what mine was born as.

    Imagine seeing this pixel art gorilla, and then he sees a second pixel art gorilla wearing a skirt. Then you see the closeup of the male gorillas face, and he wiggles his eyebrows exitedly.

    The next thing you see is a pixel art of a sperm attacking an egg. In a knockoff tamagachi meant for children. I was 13, so I was old enough to know what I was seeing, but it definately had some real WTF vibes. Let’s put it this way. I’m 41. I remember nothing else about that tamagachi besides seeing pixel art gorilla sperm.

    That’s all. I just wanted more people to know about chinese knockoff tamagachi with gorilla sperm.

    • Whats_your_reasoning@lemmy.world
      21·
      1 day ago

      It was slower, the graphics were basic, and we could get knocked offline by someone picking up a telephone. But damn, it really felt like reaching out and touching the world for the first time. It took so long for my mom to understand that yes, I can be chatting with friends online at 2am. She would always ask, “Why aren’t they asleep?” and I’d have to remind her that other time zones exist.

  • Etterra@discuss.onlineEnglish
    272·
    2 days ago

    It turned out that gatekeepers were the only ones keeping the hoard of idiots and rubes off the Internet. RIP quality free content.

    • multifariace@lemmy.world
      13·
      1 day ago

      I find quality free content everywhere. I mean, maybe not this post, but most things I see are free from quality.