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I don't disagree, but the implication of it not being at least possible without tremendous effort vaguely concerns me. Just wanted to explore the hypothetical.

I don't disagree, but the implication of it not being at least possible without tremendous effort vaguely concerns me. Just wanted to explore the hypothetical. I also mean the question narrowed down to social media, too, though. I do wonder about the future of social interaction (maybe covid has me too pessimistic).

st1x7 6y ago
Why does it concern you though? Do you think the same way about the electricity or water that are supplied to your home and whether you can live without them? It would be possible to live without them, it would just take a lot of effort and inconvenience. What's different about the Internet?
- pdkl95 6y ago
  Electricity and water are fungible (at least in reasonable household or small business quantities). Dependency on these resources doesn't necessarily require other dependencies. Dependency on internet services is transitive. From the same talk[1] by Dan Geer I quoted in an earlier post: > The root source of risk is dependence, especially dependence on the expectation of stable system state. Dependence is not only individual but mutual, not only am I dependent or not but rather a continuous scale asking whether we are dependent or not; we are, and it is called interdependence. Interdependence is transitive, hence the risk that flows from interdependence is transitive, i.e., if you depend on the digital world and I depend on you, then I, too, am at risk from failures in the digital world. If individual dependencies were only static, they would be eventually evaluable, but we regularly and quickly expand our dependence on new things, and that added dependence matters because we each and severally add risk to our portfolio by way of dependence on things for which their very newness confounds risk estimation and thus risk management. Interdependence within society is today absolutely centered on the Internet beyond all other dependencies excepting climate, and the Internet has a time rate of change five orders of magnitude faster. Remember, something becomes "a critical infrastructure" as soon as it is widely enough adopted; adoption is the gateway drug to criticality. [1] http://geer.tinho.net/geer.ncc.8x18.txt http://geer.tinho.net/geer.ncc.8x18.txt

st1x7 6y ago

Why does it concern you though? Do you think the same way about the electricity or water that are supplied to your home and whether you can live without them? It would be possible to live without them, it would just take a lot of effort and inconvenience. What's different about the Internet?

pdkl95 6y ago
Electricity and water are fungible (at least in reasonable household or small business quantities). Dependency on these resources doesn't necessarily require other dependencies. Dependency on internet services is transitive. From the same talk[1] by Dan Geer I quoted in an earlier post: > The root source of risk is dependence, especially dependence on the expectation of stable system state. Dependence is not only individual but mutual, not only am I dependent or not but rather a continuous scale asking whether we are dependent or not; we are, and it is called interdependence. Interdependence is transitive, hence the risk that flows from interdependence is transitive, i.e., if you depend on the digital world and I depend on you, then I, too, am at risk from failures in the digital world. If individual dependencies were only static, they would be eventually evaluable, but we regularly and quickly expand our dependence on new things, and that added dependence matters because we each and severally add risk to our portfolio by way of dependence on things for which their very newness confounds risk estimation and thus risk management. Interdependence within society is today absolutely centered on the Internet beyond all other dependencies excepting climate, and the Internet has a time rate of change five orders of magnitude faster. Remember, something becomes "a critical infrastructure" as soon as it is widely enough adopted; adoption is the gateway drug to criticality. [1] http://geer.tinho.net/geer.ncc.8x18.txt http://geer.tinho.net/geer.ncc.8x18.txt