Happy Birthday to the Internet

Facebook has just informed me that the Web is 25 years old today, I thought it had been around longer than that.

Re: Happy Birthday to the Internet

Pioneers indeed but wether it's for the good remains yet to be seen ...only my opinion though

Re: Happy Birthday to the Internet

I love it, but I think it should never have been made available to everyone.
It's got way out of control and there's no real way of policing it.
This dark Web stuff gives me the creeps, sounds evil!

Re: Happy Birthday to the Internet

Here is one I made earlier !

28/07/2016

Re: Happy Birthday to the Internet

Unfortunately, it seems to be a fact of life that good things are easily spoiled by idiots, criminals, and generally nasty people.

Just think back to Citizens' Band Radio in the early 80's - a wonderful facility, particularly for people who were housebound. They gathered all sorts of friends and it cost them nothing, once the initial capital outlay had been sorted. The same with people who were shy and didn't make friends very easily. There was a sort of confidence gained by being unseen behind a microphone. You could have a good old party on the air and it would cost you nothing !

Sometimes folk would arrange a meet (an eyeball) at a mutually local pub or café - great fun all round. C.B. radio was brilliant before it was made legal and the price of radios fell through the floor. In the illegal days, one had to behave on the air and not play 'silly buggers' because everybody knew that it would not take much to 'Direction Find' the idiot, get their address and report them to the police !

Of course, as soon as things were legalised and CB radios were cheap enough for youngsters to buy and use, along came the 'wallies' who made peoples' lives a misery, jamming peoples' conversations over the radio.

People, and I have to say it was mostly teenagers, were very cruel, nasty and bullying, and it drove many people away. There were many handicapped and house-bound people of all ages who treated CB radio as a sort of lifeline, and they became members of groups of people who regularly chatted on the air. They found a wonderful commodity. It gave them renewed confidence, pleasure and more importantly, friends.

It was these sort of people who were the main targets of the uncaring youngsters. CB radio was 'open channel' where anybody could listen in to other peoples' conversations if they dropped on to the same channel. These youngsters got a perverse thrill and satisfaction in causing upset by jamming that particular channel with loud music, or nasty comments, or dreadful noises. A lot of the time this activity reduced the poor 'victims' to tears, so much so that people who needed the company the most, just sold up everything and left the airwaves.

I still have my CB radio kit, but I haven't really been tempted to get on the air again to see how things were going on. Somebody told me that long distance HGV drivers still found it useful, and that the airwaves were very much clearer. They put this down to the advent of the mobile phone, and I'm sure there must be some foundation in that.

Now we have the internet. On the social networks, there are 'wallies' of course, trying to upset as many people as they can in whatever way they can. There is also a very wide-spread criminal existence. Fraudsters, hackers etc.

There is now a very unhealthy development of child abuse and hundreds of cases of 'grooming' leading to child abduction and/or assault, mostly sexual. There are, apparently, numerous sites devoted to pornography ! There are sites where there are preachers of terrorism, where young minds can be persuaded to believe that killing 'the infidel' is highly praised and a 'sure way to get to heaven' !

It would also seem that one can buy just about anything on the internet - guns etc. if you know where to look. It has to be said that much of the internet is becoming rather 'seedy' and worrying.

It grieves me that, whenever there is a brilliant commodity/facility developed, there seems to be a mass of brain-dead, so-called 'people' doing their utmost to drag everything down into the sludge where they are. Trying to ruin everything. Trying to spoil peoples' pleasure.

What is it with these people ? That they have this compulsion to destroy others' enjoyment ? Why are they allowed to live, to survive, to give them space to carry out their evil actions. WHY?

Re: Happy Birthday to the Internet

Very good post Gilly and very true as well.....the internet is like a "pandora's box" been opened...now its opened theres no going back unfortunately

Re: Happy Birthday to the Internet

Im not sure it's something to celebrate, too much badness brought to the surface and criminals have taken charge of it.

Re: Happy Birthday to the Internet

Uptil now, the creators of stuff have been Human, it is always assumed the inventors of seismic life changing articles and systems are 100% wholesome, why is that the assumption? certain negative traits, could have been designed into a system, to reflect the Human condition.

Never been a fan of the net, c'est la vie

Re: Happy Birthday to the Internet

Have you been on the magic mushrooms?

Re: Happy Birthday to the Internet

It does seem that way. It wasn't that long ago that we were all searching for a public phone box that worked either.