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I remember being so optimistic, exactly as you're describing ... ~20 years ago. Search engines, the nascent days of the blog community (rss!); open standards fo

I remember being so optimistic, exactly as you're describing ... ~20 years ago. Search engines, the nascent days of the blog community (rss!); open standards for chat (jabber/xmpp!), microformats for distributed social networks (foaf!). It was all so great, so empowering, so exciting. It was all a lie ... all those wonderful things were like chewing Coca leaves, holding great promise and benefits. But everything that came after: centralized social media, one dominant search engine, closed chat networks, centralized media ... it was akin to turning the coca leaves into cocaine. It felt amazing to see such growth, like fire. But ultimately, the sickness and addiction set in, and we see actors exploiting people using these tools. "We" are sick now, and need to figure out a way to regain our agency.

lotu 8y ago
While I sometimes feel a lot of these things, I don't think you are diagnosing the cause correctly. I don't see how the fact that we have a single dominate social networks, and search engine are the cause. I can't imagine how having a distributed social network or more competition in the search market would make people be more civil. First off, people have always been uncivil both on-line and off-line. If you look at the adoption of the internet it started among "tech" people then it was societal elites, like professors, doctors, scientists, and lawyers, then moved down the chain to office workers, collage students and so on. It should not be a surprise that as the "common" people came on the internet that the sophistication and civility of discourse decreased. The same thing would be observed if you had in-person events with these groups of people. I argue that this is the cause of decline in civility: https://www.statista.com/statistics/865523/us-offline-population-share/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/865523/us-offline-popula... not consolidation. Yes their are problems but, if you look at where hate groups and online mobs appear to be most prevalent it is in the small distributed uncontrolled forums that don't have the manpower or compulsion from corporate overlords to police this type of thing. Secondly it is incorrect to think the internet hasn't done more enormous good, if you look at marginalized communities and the ability for people to find, connect and mobilize it has been because of the internet. I don't think it is a coincidence that the acceptance of LGBT people corresponded with a massive increase in the ability to communicate with other people. Just as the printing press did not make all of humanity scholars; the internet has not made humanity civil to each other.
- CodeCube 8y ago
  This is a good take ... the comment I responded to just triggered a bit of melancholy on my part ... thanks for bringing perspective :)

lotu 8y ago

While I sometimes feel a lot of these things, I don't think you are diagnosing the cause correctly. I don't see how the fact that we have a single dominate social networks, and search engine are the cause. I can't imagine how having a distributed social network or more competition in the search market would make people be more civil. First off, people have always been uncivil both on-line and off-line. If you look at the adoption of the internet it started among "tech" people then it was societal elites, like professors, doctors, scientists, and lawyers, then moved down the chain to office workers, collage students and so on. It should not be a surprise that as the "common" people came on the internet that the sophistication and civility of discourse decreased. The same thing would be observed if you had in-person events with these groups of people. I argue that this is the cause of decline in civility: https://www.statista.com/statistics/865523/us-offline-population-share/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/865523/us-offline-popula... not consolidation. Yes their are problems but, if you look at where hate groups and online mobs appear to be most prevalent it is in the small distributed uncontrolled forums that don't have the manpower or compulsion from corporate overlords to police this type of thing. Secondly it is incorrect to think the internet hasn't done more enormous good, if you look at marginalized communities and the ability for people to find, connect and mobilize it has been because of the internet. I don't think it is a coincidence that the acceptance of LGBT people corresponded with a massive increase in the ability to communicate with other people. Just as the printing press did not make all of humanity scholars; the internet has not made humanity civil to each other.

CodeCube 8y ago
This is a good take ... the comment I responded to just triggered a bit of melancholy on my part ... thanks for bringing perspective :)