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> utterly floored at how obvious this is but almost everyone has missed it. "the information superhighway", indeed. Interestingly, there was a class of people

> utterly floored at how obvious this is but almost everyone has missed it. "the information superhighway", indeed. Interestingly, there was a class of people who never missed that from day one. "Don't believe everything you read on the internet," our teachers warned us. We scoffed: if we could be so stupid. No one believes anything you read on the internet. Only looking back do I notice the slow change. We have become a people who believe everything they see on the internet.

titzer 6y ago
> We have become a people who believe everything they see on the internet. And the "traditional" media scrambled, falling all over themselves, desperately trying to become relevant as their business model disappeared, moving their content online, competing in the cacophonic nightmare of screaming known as the internet. Little did they know that adding more signal to the noise just tricked us into believe that noise was signal.
brlewis 6y ago
> We have become a people who believe everything they see on the internet. Speak for yourself. I only believe things I see on the Internet if they fit my preconceived ideas.
searchableguy 6y ago
How do I make people go back to the old days?
- belorn 6y ago
  Bring back national TV broadcast as peoples primary source of information?
paloaltokid 6y ago
> Only looking back do I notice the slow change. We have become a people who believe everything they see on the internet. These days, if something is NOT on the internet, it is suspect. Even if the evidence is in a well-researched book, if people can't find a URL for it, they immediately dismiss arguments out of hand. You see it all the time on this forum as well.
coffeecat 6y ago
I once had a disagreement with a colleague about a claim in a lab manual for undergraduates. About 10 seconds into the discussion, his instinctive reaction was "Does the internet say that's right?" After speaking with the professor that teaches the class, his instinct was also to check that the internet says it's right before updating the lab manual. I had a simple argument based on a well-known formula, but ultimately it's the internet that decides whether it's right or not.
- Gunax 6y ago
  Perhaps the internet is best understood as a reasonable shorthand for general consensus.

titzer 6y ago

> We have become a people who believe everything they see on the internet. And the "traditional" media scrambled, falling all over themselves, desperately trying to become relevant as their business model disappeared, moving their content online, competing in the cacophonic nightmare of screaming known as the internet. Little did they know that adding more signal to the noise just tricked us into believe that noise was signal.

brlewis 6y ago

> We have become a people who believe everything they see on the internet. Speak for yourself. I only believe things I see on the Internet if they fit my preconceived ideas.

searchableguy 6y ago

How do I make people go back to the old days?

belorn 6y ago
Bring back national TV broadcast as peoples primary source of information?

paloaltokid 6y ago

> Only looking back do I notice the slow change. We have become a people who believe everything they see on the internet. These days, if something is NOT on the internet, it is suspect. Even if the evidence is in a well-researched book, if people can't find a URL for it, they immediately dismiss arguments out of hand. You see it all the time on this forum as well.

coffeecat 6y ago

I once had a disagreement with a colleague about a claim in a lab manual for undergraduates. About 10 seconds into the discussion, his instinctive reaction was "Does the internet say that's right?" After speaking with the professor that teaches the class, his instinct was also to check that the internet says it's right before updating the lab manual. I had a simple argument based on a well-known formula, but ultimately it's the internet that decides whether it's right or not.

Gunax 6y ago
Perhaps the internet is best understood as a reasonable shorthand for general consensus.