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No, Internet was always like this (even worse), just there was much less people on it, and expectations were different. Back in the days of USENET there was a l
by ivanhoe 10y ago
No, Internet was always like this (even worse), just there was much less people on it, and expectations were different. Back in the days of USENET there was a lot of quite unpleasant people you'd run into occasionally, but we've seen it as a part of the scene. Like going on a punk concert and someone spills a beer on you or a fight breaks out. It's not nice experience, but it's the part of the show, partially it's what makes it what it is. In my view it's not trolls who are destroying the Internet, but those who are trying to regulate every single aspect of it, instead of teaching people to more self respect and defiance as a way to deal with assholes. And author is right about that one, it will turn all human interaction into a superficial social equivalent of Potemkin villages where we'll be afraid to speak up without 2 pages of legal disclaimers first.
- sp332 10y agoIt's not true that nothing has changed. Facebook and Twitter will show you posts that they think you're likely to interact with, and hide other stories. That didn't happen on Usenet. Those services will also recommend that you follow/friend other users with similar interests, which automatically builds up mobs. That's not how the Internet used to work.
- houst0n_ 10y agoRight but if people are never going to click on stories they're not interested in then does it really matter? Can we really blame increasing silo-mind on certain demographics not seeing links that they demonstratively wouldn't have opened anyway?
- sp332 10y agoYes, I would say that just browsing a table of contents gives you an idea of what's being talked about and what's getting the most attention, even if you never click through anything. And I don't think the algorithms are that good. It's probably just sorting people into a few discrete buckets.