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Best guess is that by monolithic the author means homogeneous. Watching instructional videos on nail care is more educational than Family Ties, for sure, but it

Best guess is that by monolithic the author means homogeneous. Watching instructional videos on nail care is more educational than Family Ties, for sure, but it's easier to get stuck on a very specific value system or culture on the internet. The smorgasboard of teh internets means that we never have to consume anything we don't already like. In a perverted way, having access to billions of small pieces of content homogenizes our personal experiences. When there's only a few pieces of content, the differentiation comes in our experiences with it. You and I may have something to talk about if we're both reading Walden. But if you've been watching unboxing videos of new laptops and I've been catching up on how to build fairy houses it doesn't matter that we're both living in the same house. That's a little sad.

Nadya 11y ago
>but it's easier to get stuck on a very specific value system or culture on the internet. It's even easier to do that offline. >You and I may have something to talk about if we're both reading Walden. But if you've been watching unboxing videos of new laptops and I've been catching up on how to build fairy houses it doesn't matter that we're both living in the same house. That's a little sad. Only if the person interested in laptop specs and the person interested in building fairy houses never share their interests with one another. Perhaps both have more to learn, not just about each other, but things in general than if both were reading Walden?
- secstate 11y ago
  That's a fair argument, but in my experiences those two people do not share their interests. If you live with children in the house, you know how that goes. Now going offline with things is no promise that there will be more shared culture, but there's more of a chance than a world where we have access to exactly what we're interested in all the time (via cellphones, especially). There is a feedback loop to our lives online that is not present when we're forced into social situations with people that we don't necessarily see eye to eye with. Note, it's not always fun to be with people we don't see eye to eye with (witness: family car trips) but if we don't learn conflict resolution and tolerance there, the internet sure isn't going to help.
  - Nadya 11y ago
    >That's a fair argument, but in my experiences those two people do not share their interests. If you live with children in the house, you know how that goes. Having 5 younger siblings - I know very well how this goes. But is it a problem? If they lack similar interests what difference does it make if they're both reading books if the books are different? If one is reading romance literature and the other Stephen King, are they in any better a situation? Myself and the eldest of my siblings talk a lot about our personal interests, though we share very little of the same interests. We both enjoy learning and make a great effort to empathize with each other and understand each others' hobbies and do our best to encourage them. This close relationship, sadly, does not exist with my other siblings. I largely blame the age gap. I'm only 3 years older than the eldest but over 12 years older than the rest of them. I don't disagree that offline has more potential for running into contradictory opinions and viewpoints. That's why I find comment sections so important, although they are often dwindling and filled with flamebaiting trolls they are also one of the few sources of contradicting opinions that some people face. But that same offline experience shows me that many people live in their own social bubbles of people with similarly-held beliefs. Religious institutions are my best example for this. How often do you find a Christian at a Mosque or reading the Quran? They're mostly attending their own Church and associating with other people who go to that Church who largely hold the same beliefs they do. This extends to fanclubs, school cliques, and more social structures. People don't tend to branch out. Offline or online the scenario, to me, is largely the same and just as sad.
    - swsieber 11y ago
      I'm mostly addressing the last half of your comment. I agree that polarization is very bad (about trolls vs. yes men in comments). It prevents real discussion. Perhaps, but consider the following, which will be a reason to encourage off-topic conversations. You have multiple 'similar-interest groups' that you belong to that are orthogonal - my work buddies have different religious views and my fellow congregational members have different occupations than I. IIRC, Facebook edits what they show you in the feed based on what you click a lot - so what you are provided with tends to be what you agree with. And other non-interactive material make it harder to have conversation. Lastly, I think things done online usually happen in the context of an online community that tends to anchor the conversation there - not necessarily bad, but potentially if the conversation/community is homogenous. Really the solution is to try and talk about things we disagree about - and with children, it probably happens rarely unless we consciously try to do so.

Nadya 11y ago

>but it's easier to get stuck on a very specific value system or culture on the internet. It's even easier to do that offline. >You and I may have something to talk about if we're both reading Walden. But if you've been watching unboxing videos of new laptops and I've been catching up on how to build fairy houses it doesn't matter that we're both living in the same house. That's a little sad. Only if the person interested in laptop specs and the person interested in building fairy houses never share their interests with one another. Perhaps both have more to learn, not just about each other, but things in general than if both were reading Walden?

secstate 11y ago
That's a fair argument, but in my experiences those two people do not share their interests. If you live with children in the house, you know how that goes. Now going offline with things is no promise that there will be more shared culture, but there's more of a chance than a world where we have access to exactly what we're interested in all the time (via cellphones, especially). There is a feedback loop to our lives online that is not present when we're forced into social situations with people that we don't necessarily see eye to eye with. Note, it's not always fun to be with people we don't see eye to eye with (witness: family car trips) but if we don't learn conflict resolution and tolerance there, the internet sure isn't going to help.
- Nadya 11y ago
  >That's a fair argument, but in my experiences those two people do not share their interests. If you live with children in the house, you know how that goes. Having 5 younger siblings - I know very well how this goes. But is it a problem? If they lack similar interests what difference does it make if they're both reading books if the books are different? If one is reading romance literature and the other Stephen King, are they in any better a situation? Myself and the eldest of my siblings talk a lot about our personal interests, though we share very little of the same interests. We both enjoy learning and make a great effort to empathize with each other and understand each others' hobbies and do our best to encourage them. This close relationship, sadly, does not exist with my other siblings. I largely blame the age gap. I'm only 3 years older than the eldest but over 12 years older than the rest of them. I don't disagree that offline has more potential for running into contradictory opinions and viewpoints. That's why I find comment sections so important, although they are often dwindling and filled with flamebaiting trolls they are also one of the few sources of contradicting opinions that some people face. But that same offline experience shows me that many people live in their own social bubbles of people with similarly-held beliefs. Religious institutions are my best example for this. How often do you find a Christian at a Mosque or reading the Quran? They're mostly attending their own Church and associating with other people who go to that Church who largely hold the same beliefs they do. This extends to fanclubs, school cliques, and more social structures. People don't tend to branch out. Offline or online the scenario, to me, is largely the same and just as sad.
  - swsieber 11y ago
    I'm mostly addressing the last half of your comment. I agree that polarization is very bad (about trolls vs. yes men in comments). It prevents real discussion. Perhaps, but consider the following, which will be a reason to encourage off-topic conversations. You have multiple 'similar-interest groups' that you belong to that are orthogonal - my work buddies have different religious views and my fellow congregational members have different occupations than I. IIRC, Facebook edits what they show you in the feed based on what you click a lot - so what you are provided with tends to be what you agree with. And other non-interactive material make it harder to have conversation. Lastly, I think things done online usually happen in the context of an online community that tends to anchor the conversation there - not necessarily bad, but potentially if the conversation/community is homogenous. Really the solution is to try and talk about things we disagree about - and with children, it probably happens rarely unless we consciously try to do so.