this post was submitted on 25 Sep 2023
36 points (89.1% liked)

Ask Lemmy

27253 readers
3604 users here now

A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions


Rules: (interactive)


1) Be nice and; have funDoxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them


2) All posts must end with a '?'This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?


3) No spamPlease do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.


4) NSFW is okay, within reasonJust remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either [email protected] or [email protected]. NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].


5) This is not a support community.
It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions. If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email [email protected]. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.


6) No US Politics.
Please don't post about current US Politics. If you need to do this, try [email protected] or [email protected]


Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.

Partnered Communities:

Tech Support

No Stupid Questions

You Should Know

Reddit

Jokes

Ask Ouija


Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu


founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

Suppose the internet was still a major success and was sustainable without compromising for commercial interests. How do you think societies around the world may have changed, or not?

Consider the optimistic angles of such an unencumbered space extended out from the internet's earlier days to the present. What if some of those possibilities had been realized?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

but the truth is that without the ability to sell ideas on/about/using the internet, it wouldnt have been widely adopted except in educational settings, and only for information storage/retrieval.

fwiw I don't think you're wrong given the circumstances the internet came about in, and that persist in a different form today, however the idea behind the question was to try to encourage one to try to imagine different circumstances. If the internet/the web had managed to develop and be widely adopted despite the circumstances around it and commercial pressures that have arguably warped it into something rather different than what it could have been, how might that have influenced society in turn?

It's less about looking back with rose-tinted glasses, and more about trying to re-envision how it might have developed differently. One could very much say that the whole pitch of stuff like lemmy and federated software is an attempt at doing just that, but I think it's even more interesting to consider on a broader scope.