July 9, 2002

nitemares on the web

I have to admit that i find it more unbearable to deal with the Internet every day. Rather than being a utopian environment, it brings out the collective worst in humanity. And yet hides the abusers behind a digital curtain, allowing them to be unapologetic and invasively abusive without any form of regulation to stop them. I've noticed a trend in my mail lately.... It used to be the case that my email was filled with messages about crazy new ideas, potential, excitement, check this out, wow, yippee. Good conversations, engaging thought, people becoming aware of the digital realm and its possibilities. Lately, it's become the same bitchy environment that i live in on a daily basis. The he-said she-said has gotten out of control and the abuses are horrifying. My email is no longer primarily positive, but primarily negative or concerned. And for good reason.

On today's list of interesting additions:
- spammers have stopped being apologetic 'cause the regulation just ain't working, so they won't suffer the consequences
- Microsoft is moving to a mandatory panopticon, with no user choice
- video games reduce brain activity (and what about TVs?)
- Carnivore continues to get more vicious
- surveillance is not just a sci-fi idea

Ok.. that's enough. At least there are still some things out there to make me smile:
- a VW bug transformer!
- mathematical/multi-dimensional legos!
- Google's mirror

Category: digitalness

Posted by zephoria at July 9, 2002 2:35 PM