Do You Remember Life before the Internet?
Sometimes I wonder what am I doing right now if there were no Internet.
shareYou'd be doing the things people do when they're not on the Internet.
shareWhich are?
shareSpending time with your family & friends, going to the mall, going to movies in a movie theater/watching TV - we've done that for 50 years. Playing sports, taking a walk and eating at a restaurant are a few things I can think of.
shareExcept many people are still tethered to the internet doing those activities. Not specifically internet related, but go to pretty much any concert today, and you end up looking at the stage through banks of electronic pacifiers. ie smartphones wafting in the air. A great concert is just as much about a great crowd as it is great bands, thousands of people in the moment, sharing a collective experience. Even walking in nature has changed over the years, I am lucky to live close to a large, gorgeous park with dozens of long interconnected, tree lined trails inside, it is becoming more and more a challenge having to navigate through people walking head down, staring into a mobile gadget screen, oblivious to their surroundings.
shareThis post is what did people do before the internet. You're talking about phones. I think phones & the internet get confused. The internet has been around for 20 years, but it's not been that long that we've had these sophisticated smartphones. People choose to take phones with them when they're doing things where that's not quite appropriate, like walking or hiking. But there are many things people do and should be doing without phones.
shareWe were also talking about phones; not just the internet. Actually, you do get internet on your phone, so it's basically the same thing. The two go hand and hand.
Let's just put it this way..... do you remember what it was like without all of this crap?
If you want to go back further, I'll bet people asked the same thing about Telephones, and the automobile over 100 years ago.
No, cell phones and the internet are not the same things. I am posting using this other thing called a computer. lol People always ask what they did before they become dependent on certain technology, but inventions/technology have moved faster in the past 20-30 years than ever before.
shareI beg to differ on the cell phones/computers. You do get the internet on your phone. In any case, many of us were also talking about phones too. With technology the way it is, they can do everything now days. I have no doubt that one day there will be an app. that bathes me!
shareI never said you couldn't get the internet on a phone. The reason you say this thread is about phones & the internet is that as I said, you think they are the same and they aren't. One is an object you hold in your hand and the other is a network of communication and information.
shareOk.
shareObviously one is a physical object, and one is a network (that also includes physical objects), but in today's world, most people (especially under a certain age), use the former to connect and interact with the world, via the latter, and increasingly that includes in all kinds of public settings, such as spending time with family & friends, at the mall, at the movies, when watching TV, taking a walk, eating at a restaurant, etc, etc.
shareIt is 2017, very few people use basic cell phones, they are using smartphones, essentially small but very powerful computers, that are constantly connected to the internet. So when someone is out in public staring into their smartphone, in all likelihood they are utilizing the internet in some fashion.
shareUhm, those little smartphones are connected to something, oh that's right, its's called the internet.
shareI have no idea what your multiple posts mean. They have nothing to do with the original post (not written by me) & I'm not sure what they have to do with anything.
shareAll my posts are related the topic, OP, whereas yours seem to really miss the point. Food for thought.
Firstly, it could be said that just like the explosion in desktop computers from the mid 1990's to mid 2000's, smartphones would not have become a fraction as popular, if not for its connectivity to the internet. Conversely, if personal computers (desktop or smartphones) had not made it so easy for the masses to utilize the internet, the internet itself would have remained relatively niche in its usage (business, university, geeks). One without the other, would not have had anywhere near the same impact on society.
When people are talking about life without the internet, they are essentially talking about life before the information age, of which both the internet and computers (desktop and smartphones) are a part of.
Second,even if a person "decides" to not PERSONALLY utilize the internet themselves when in public settings, it does not mean they will be totally free of its influence, and increasingly that is the case. When it comes to internet usage today, for more and more people being in public settings is just an extension of the living room or bedroom. Unless you live in a vacuum, it is hard to not be impacted by that shift in society, either by accessing the internet yourself while in public, or by others you are spending time with doing so.
All my posts are very much on point with the OP and you initial reply, not sure why that is so difficult for you to understand.