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that's quite a restrictive view of how much the internet changed _everything_ across the planet, from culture to work

by herval 3y ago

jodrellblank 3y ago
Oh what a frustratingly low effort reply to my high effort comment. Come on, if you want to make the claim that the internet changed _everything_ you can back it up with some examples - especially when the claim was not "nothing changed" but "things don't feel as different" - so the examples should not be "someone far away does something differently" or "some behind the scenes organisation was more efficient", but things everyday us (HN readers) feel in day to day life. No telephone to telephone is a HUGE change. Telephone call to digital PBX over fibre to packet switched VoIP to WhatsApp feels like no change at all.
- herval 3y ago
  True, I’m not very used to internet debates lasting longer than one or two low effort replies, so I became dismissive too. Apologies. I don’t really have hard data that proves the impact of the internet at a macro level, just anecdotal stuff. I think it’s easy to overplay the impact of past innovations bc we see the late waves - eg the telephone wasn’t really a thing that impacted most of the world for decades, and there’s entirely countries that went from no telephone at all to whatsapp directly (brazil for instance) When it comes to jobs, I think I know maybe a dozen people whose jobs/industries only exist because of the Internet - and that’s counting outside the tech bubble, mind you. I’m sure this is verifiable with labor data somehow. Not to mention the entire middle class slipping into gigs in a model that only exists because of the internet (maybe a bit too recent for most to grasp the consequences). On a personal level - quite literally everything in my life would’ve been completely different. I can’t even imagine the kind of local job I’d have at a small town, watching about stuff on the TV and hearing about tech only from a friend over radio

that's quite a restrictive view of how much the internet changed _everything_ across the planet, from culture to work

by herval 3y ago

that's quite a restrictive view of how much the internet changed _everything_ across the planet, from culture to work

Oh what a frustratingly low effort reply to my high effort comment. Come on, if you want to make the claim that the internet changed _everything_ you can back it up with some examples - especially when the claim was not "nothing changed" but "things don't feel as different" - so the examples should not be "someone far away does something differently" or "some behind the scenes organisation was more efficient", but things everyday us (HN readers) feel in day to day life. No telephone to telephone is a HUGE change. Telephone call to digital PBX over fibre to packet switched VoIP to WhatsApp feels like no change at all.

herval 3y ago
True, I’m not very used to internet debates lasting longer than one or two low effort replies, so I became dismissive too. Apologies. I don’t really have hard data that proves the impact of the internet at a macro level, just anecdotal stuff. I think it’s easy to overplay the impact of past innovations bc we see the late waves - eg the telephone wasn’t really a thing that impacted most of the world for decades, and there’s entirely countries that went from no telephone at all to whatsapp directly (brazil for instance) When it comes to jobs, I think I know maybe a dozen people whose jobs/industries only exist because of the Internet - and that’s counting outside the tech bubble, mind you. I’m sure this is verifiable with labor data somehow. Not to mention the entire middle class slipping into gigs in a model that only exists because of the internet (maybe a bit too recent for most to grasp the consequences). On a personal level - quite literally everything in my life would’ve been completely different. I can’t even imagine the kind of local job I’d have at a small town, watching about stuff on the TV and hearing about tech only from a friend over radio