everything from everyday life to global politics would be better if not for radio, television, and the internet

agree/disagree?

12/14/2006 9:48:42 PM

I disagree completely.

12/14/2006 9:51:30 PM

video killed the radio star

I guess you are assuming most people are dumbasses then, if so then I agree

but I can't imagine living without the internetz, seriously

12/14/2006 9:54:50 PM

this is a stupid fucking thread.

12/14/2006 9:54:54 PM

I think it might've killed a particular image of society, sure. And I don't think the thread's stupid. People rarely discuss the negative impacts of the information age on society.

12/14/2006 10:28:20 PM

1.5 out of 4 people get this thread

its a double edge sword people

sure life's "better" and "easier" today than it was a hundred years ago

but is it really "better" and "easier"?

times used to simpler

12/14/2006 10:57:25 PM

"Life" was no simpler back then. More accurately, society actively eliminated options back then, thus making decisions appear simpler. What job do I take? Whom do I marry? These questions were often answered for you, thus making life remarkably simple, the only question is how you manage to make yourself happy under these conditions.

This type of simplification is easily replicated. Simply pick some other people to make your life choices. This can be your parents, a close friend, or someone on TWW.

[Edited on December 14, 2006 at 11:08 PM. Reason : .,.]

12/14/2006 11:07:26 PM

You can still be as simple as you want. I, however, choose to use the resources at my disposal.

12/14/2006 11:07:40 PM

politics changed after the radio was introduced, and especially after tv

everything seemed to change with JFK--at least the way politicians were politicians. more than half of a politician's job nowadays is worrying about public perception. would the country be so divided politically if there was no tv or internet around telling us what to think?

same thing with wars--vietnam and iraq would probably be very different wars if reporters weren't hovering over everything everyday telling all of us back home the types of things that go on in war.

there's so many criticisms and perceptions revolving around every aspect of everything. so many voiced opinions, so many more opportunities to do things.

are more oportunites always a good thing?

12/14/2006 11:08:14 PM

I couldn't go back to life without Internet access.

Even life without Google would be hard.

12/14/2006 11:28:03 PM

oh i'm not saying take it back

i'm saying imagine if it never existed in the first place

12/14/2006 11:30:45 PM

yeah, it was called middle school

and no, i don't ever want to go back to that time

12/14/2006 11:40:38 PM

Quote :

"sure life's "better" and "easier" today than it was a hundred years ago but is it really "better" and "easier"? "

this is a pretty dumb quote sure,

but is it really a pretty dumb quote?

12/14/2006 11:42:53 PM

you're just bitter b/c i said you were .5 of a person

12/14/2006 11:55:54 PM

12/15/2006 12:13:40 AM

Quote :

"sure life's "better" and "easier" today than it was a hundred years ago but is it really "better" and "easier"? times used to simpler"

It goes back to the old saying that "Ignorance is bliss." Would it be better to not know about how the rest of the world is? To limit individual choices and force them into very narrow and limited paths? Or perhaps are we giving people so many choices that they suffer a sort of "choice anxiety" where they have to choose between and select from too many different options?

With regards specifically to the news, is it better for people to sit in blissful ignorance, their views more easily influenced by a small handful of people in the newspaper editorial rooms and the voices from Washington DC or for people to be overwhelmed with hundreds of different, conflicting voices and viewpoints? Obscuring the truth by controlling data access or obscuring through flooding the airwaves and bandwidth with lots of chaff?

Better to be the ignorant country bumpkin who has no idea of anything that goes on beyond his village or the angry Internet junkie who's overwhelmed with information and ends up insecure and confused?

I don't think it's necessarily better or worse, just different.

12/15/2006 12:52:04 AM

100 years ago, things sucked pretty bad.

For starters, blacks couldn't vote, women couldn't vote, and medical knowledge and technology was TERRIBLE.

If you could live 100 years ago knowing what you know now (and are a while male), things might not be so bad for you. Otherwise, it would suck badly.

12/15/2006 1:10:40 AM

Dude

Go chill in central Africa for a year

And if you haven't shit your internal organs out, come back and claim life isn't easy here.

12/15/2006 1:17:18 AM

you know what was fun?

Polio

man i miss those days.

12/15/2006 1:23:45 AM

what about AIDS?

12/15/2006 1:35:52 AM

haha, what a stupid fucking thread

12/15/2006 4:07:22 AM

you know

there are still places where people don't have tv, the internet, or even any running water

what say you just go ask them if they'd rather have that, or google

fucking tard

[Edited on December 15, 2006 at 4:33 AM. Reason : DAMMIT, BECAUSE I ONLY LOG IN FOR 5 MINUTES A DAY AT 4 FUCKING 30 AM, MY IDEAS ARE ALREADY POSTED]

12/15/2006 4:32:58 AM

to take this thread remotely serious for a moment

i think what you really need to do is evaluate what introductions you want to stop this at

the introduction of the "mass" internet - i.e., when tech-savy americans started using eudora or shit like that, not when your uncle started emailing your mom fucking chain mail

the introduction of the computer as something that doesn't take up a city block

the introduction of commonly available mass air travel

the introduction of television

the introduction of public works programs

the introduction of the consumer automobile

the introduction of radio

the introduction of sanitary concerns, such as "germs" and shit

hell, how about we just look at the fucking introduction of the printing press, or even the introduction of the common language instead of high latin for church services

then this thread would mean a lot more than just "WHAT IF WE HAD EVERY OTHER ADVANCEMENT, WE JUST NEVER FIGURED OUT HOW TO MANIPULATE RADIO WAVES, FIRE A CATHODE RAY GUN, OR TRANSMIT PACKETS???"

12/15/2006 4:40:42 AM

yep

no one gets this thread except for Gamecat

because people would die without google

which is exactly my point

we're too dependent on all these things

today we're lazy trying to find the next thing that will make our lives even lazier

lazy fucks

12/15/2006 9:20:25 AM

Progress! Flobble-de flee. Why in my day we had to get our butts up off the couch and change the channels ourselves. We had three stations and we liked it! If Walter Cronkite didn't think you needed to know something..he wouldn't tell you.

The Int-er-net..fooey! We had to wait for days to get our news...gave us more time to stare at the sun!

12/15/2006 10:22:31 AM

^^have you read:

"Industrial Society and Its Future"
by Theodore John Kaczynski

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Industrial_Society_and_Its_Future

[Edited on December 15, 2006 at 10:26 AM. Reason : ]

12/15/2006 10:26:30 AM

This thread is sofa king stupid it isn't even funny.

12/15/2006 10:36:25 AM

^how is it stupid?

It obviously has merit.

Just because you aren't smart enough to understand doesn't mean you should call it "stupid".....

12/15/2006 10:51:58 AM

i'm not trying to be some neo-techno-phobe...and no, i'm not really into the unabomber

i see the importance of these things we have everyday, i just think they're better suited for the work place or for doing something productive--not as an everyday leisure that's used by everyone just because they can

15 years ago no one had cell phones, no one had text messaging, no one had email and now people can't function without those things and everyday relationships have been forever altered due to the way we communicate with people

seriously, if it wasn't for things like facebook and myspace you probably wouldn't be keeping in touch with people you knew 15 years ago and you also wouldn't be subjected to all the negative creepy personal aspects that comes with those things.

would identity theft be such a big thing if there was no internet and the mass majority of us that throws out our credit card and social security numbers like it's nothing?

12/15/2006 11:10:03 AM

Quote :

"seriously, if it wasn't for things like facebook and myspace telephones and automobiles you probably wouldn't be keeping in touch with people you knew 15 years ago and you also wouldn't be subjected to all the negative creepy personal aspects that comes with those things."

seriously you could say this about any generation. perhaps things are little bit more accelerated these days. but i really don't see how you can judge if something is better or worse. while communication changes may make things a bit too immediate. but these advances also allow for communication between scientists so that they can make advances more quickly. they also allow people to find out about their elected officials, making a more informed populace. etc etc etc. there's good and bad. and it's always happened and it always will.

12/15/2006 11:14:30 AM

Quote :

"but these advances also allow for communication between scientists so that they can make advances more quickly. they also allow people to find out about their elected officials, making a more informed populace."

Quote :

"i see the importance of these things we have everyday, i just think they're better suited for the work place or for doing something productive--not as an everyday leisure that's used by everyone just because they can "

12/15/2006 11:24:01 AM

if there wasn't a consumer demand for these products, the impetus for advancement wouldn't be as strong and your presumed worthwhile uses wouldn't advance as quickly. if people didn't check out myspace, craigslist and ebay everyday would political blogs have any traction? there are plenty of examples like this.

12/15/2006 11:27:53 AM

either this is the best troll ever

or, well, you're bascially making a mockery of yourself

Quote :

" would identity theft be such a big thing if there was no internet and the mass majority of us that throws out our credit card and social security numbers like it's nothing?"

at this point you're grasping at straws to keep us posting

in a near cashless society, identity theft is the newest version counterfeiting

if you think people weren't fabricating signets and shit in the middle ages to do basically the same thing as "identity theft", and if you think people weren't making fake credit cards and using other people's credit cards 15 years ago, you're just ignoring shit for the fun of it

troll thread

12/15/2006 12:14:02 PM

I disagree the information age killed society. It did away with a tremendous amount of ignorance while creating a new sub species of "know it alls".

We are smarter overall because the information is so much easier to obtain. We are raised with this knowledge and build upon it. With knowledge comes opportunities... so now more people who 40 years ago would not be able to afford the education they need to succeed in life are becoming doctors, businessmen... lawyers... okay we could do without the lawyers but you get the idea.

Before being a nerd was looked down upon. Now nerds rule the world. It's harder to fool a populace that's well informed. 40 years ago it was 3 TV channels newspapers and word of mouth.

Now it's TV, Websites, Email, PAgers, Phones, ... you get the idea. Society is now ever more interconnected than ever before.

Society did not die, it evolved. Those that think it died are those that don't want to evolve with society. It's not as friendly or close, but more spread out now.

12/15/2006 12:22:57 PM

best post of the thread^

12/15/2006 12:25:51 PM

I tend to agree with Raige, but I'm not sure. Sadly, it seems that the majority of the information here in the tubes is blatantly wrong. A lot of it certainly is. It's easier to find the facts, now, yes, but it's also easier to find misinformation. And the misinformation spreads faster than ever.

12/15/2006 12:41:32 PM

you know a thread is failing when the original poster has to congratulate people for "getting it." see mcadanger's abortion of a thread for another example.

12/15/2006 12:41:43 PM

^troll thread

if duke wants to lock anything, he should lock this before any of the really dumb people see it

and i think we all know who i'm talking about

12/15/2006 12:46:14 PM

it is a troll thread

which is why most did not take it seriously.

12/15/2006 12:47:16 PM

Quote :

"CharlieEFH: everyday relationships have been forever altered due to the way we communicate with people"

This is the idea I was compelled to post on. The information age has killed an old image of social interaction. Who honestly calls people from a home telephone anymore?

Quote :

"GoldenViper: And the misinformation spreads faster than ever."

Exactly. True "knowledge" still spreads slowly. For all of people's bantering about how much easier facts are to find, ask them what percentage of their brains they use and you'll see what I mean. The myth about the 10% of the brain humans use has been squashed repeatedly, and the info about it is widely available on the Internet today, but people will still reflexively answer 10%.

[Edited on December 15, 2006 at 2:03 PM. Reason : ...]

12/15/2006 2:00:43 PM

Quote :

"Who honestly calls people from a home telephone anymore?"

Plenty of people. I don't much, but my parents still take a recieve calls from the home phone.

Quote :

"and the info about it is widely available on the Internet today,"

Yeah, Google brought that up instantly. And the ARMA website came up first when I Googled "sword + weigh." That's actually pretty cool. Good info seems to be winning out, at least in these cases.

12/15/2006 2:14:45 PM

Quote :

"This is the idea I was compelled to post on. The information age has killed an old image of social interaction. Who honestly calls people from a home telephone anymore?"

Just a couple days ago, the N&O ran a fluff piece about how young adults mourn on facebook/myspace pages.

That's about as impersonal as it gets, in my opinion.

And plenty of people do call from their home phones. But there's another group of people that are on their cell phones all the time, saying less than ever. I get calls from friends, and they're all, "I'm on my way to class, stuck in traffic. Figured I'd check in with you.........okay, I'm here! Call ya later!"

12/15/2006 5:09:03 PM

Quote :

"And plenty of people do call from their home phones. But there's another group of people that are on their cell phones all the time, saying less than ever. I get calls from friends, and they're all, "I'm on my way to class, stuck in traffic. Figured I'd check in with you.........okay, I'm here! Call ya later!"

The one the gets me every time is [answer phone] "I'll call you back in a minute" [/answer phone]

And it's funny how many people do it. Why answer the phone in the first place, let it ring through to voicemail and call back when you're done.

12/15/2006 6:05:03 PM

now this thread's picking

gg Gamecat for getting it

12/15/2006 6:08:19 PM

Quote :

"I disagree the information age killed society. It did away with a tremendous amount of ignorance while creating a new sub species of "know it alls". We are smarter overall because the information is so much easier to obtain. We are raised with this knowledge and build upon it. With knowledge comes opportunities... so now more people who 40 years ago would not be able to afford the education they need to succeed in life are becoming doctors, businessmen... lawyers... okay we could do without the lawyers but you get the idea. Before being a nerd was looked down upon. Now nerds rule the world. It's harder to fool a populace that's well informed. 40 years ago it was 3 TV channels newspapers and word of mouth. Now it's TV, Websites, Email, PAgers, Phones, ... you get the idea. Society is now ever more interconnected than ever before. Society did not die, it evolved. Those that think it died are those that don't want to evolve with society. It's not as friendly or close, but more spread out now."

I don't think access to more information makes anyone necessarily smarter: it makes for a society of anxiety and apathy with regards to what to do about any of the issues addressed. Even when we get news of impending disaster, we don't trust it until we can see it for ourselves (and by then, it'll be too late anyhow). It's not about empowering nerds or the human populace, since even science and technology are relative (despite that they've become the new religion for most Americans). What's "truth" in a society where everyone has an opinion that can be heard?

[Edited on December 15, 2006 at 7:45 PM. Reason : .]

12/15/2006 7:43:45 PM

can you imagine life before computers?

man i cant imagine what people like us would do if we didnt have computers

12/15/2006 7:47:55 PM

its on like donkey kong

12/15/2006 8:57:12 PM

Quote :

"man i cant imagine what people like us would do if we didnt have computers"

that's sad

and exactly what i'm talking about

because there was a time when people's lives didn't revolve around computers and emails and tet messages every 5 seconds

[Edited on December 15, 2006 at 10:01 PM. Reason : asd]

12/15/2006 10:01:15 PM

If you think it's sad now, wait about forty years.

It'll be crazy then.

"Back in my day, there wasn't any this virtual reality stuff. We had keyboards, kids, keyboards! And mice. We used text, good old text, and maybe a .gif or .jpg here and there. You punks, you spoiled punks."

That's the type of shit we'll be saying... in a VR-world, of course.

12/16/2006 10:59:19 AM

3/19/2023 2:15:08 PM