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I'm a little older than that, but I've gone through a similar evolution from the analog age. We learned to read paper maps and not depend on telephones for everything and all that. I do sometimes wonder if all the convenience we've brought to the world has disadvantaged people. I have young relatives who seem relatively helpless without their devices, and while they're untroubled by that, it does make me wonder if we've gone off track.
Chief
Most certainly, a very good backup plan and yes it does feel like a game to find your way to a destination. Great for cognitive function
I am. I know every generation feels like the next one has it all wrong and that it's cliche of me to think the same thing, but I can't help it. My kids are growing up in the iPad era and I hate it. I won't get them one and try to limit screen time as much as I can, but it's so ubiquitous now that that's a futile effort. I wish they could've experienced the childhood I had. I'm so glad that I got the opportunity to be bored as a kid - it forced you to be so creative. This new generation isn't ever going to experience that because stimulation is always just a click away.
Chief
I think most certainly old times were better, we were closer together as a humanity. Instead of pulling out the phones after the song, they might talk to one another or reflect. That is quite a memorable sight to see. I’m trying grayscaling my phone this week to see if it helps with my own addiction
Early 90s kid here... and yeah they threw us into the wild west of the internet with ZERO guard rails. The fact we're not MORE messed up than we are is an absolute miracle.
We've also uniquely (80s/90s kids) got crazy deep insight into technology at its bare bones AND kept up with the abstractions on top. Probably more adaptable to technology chamges than most other generations at the moment.
Chief
With chat rooms and no parental oversight, definitely. No one knew how it would evolve
I was a kid in the 90s and a teenager in the 00s. I remember everything from Apple IIs in kindergarten to Intel iMacs in high school. I remember the first time I saw a Tamigotchi and using dialup to send email at home. I remember a childhood relatively free of screens, and when there were screens, it was much more focused, cool, and useful, not the drudge of distraction and fakery it is now. I remember learning Hypercard on a Macintosh Plus and hacking the little talking 3D popup agent named Victor to say funny crap on the old Windows ME HP Pavilion. I remember learning HTML and Javascript and swapping floppies with my buddy on Windows 95, 2000, and XP, and getting into Linux and messing around in IRC for the first time.
I used to have a fairly rosy vision of tech on up through about 2020 I guess. I thought it was cool and fun to work with, and most of all I believed it would continue curing the world of its ills and promoting freedom, and whatever negatives it introduced would be far outweighed by the positives.
I now realize it's the complete opposite. We have been building a Tower of Babel. Every new advancement promises to solve the problems of yesteryear, but ten worse problems get introduced instead.
Everyone sacrifices everything they are at the altar of efficiency, convenience, profit, and novelty. Everyone spins ever faster and runs ever harder trying to keep up. Or if they don't, their lives are frittered away on addictive distractions. That's not a new story, but it's accelerated by ten billion with modern tech.
What is a new story is that community has been gutted, meaning has been monetized, purpose now requires a subscription. While we thought the early internet was a place for free thought, modern tech puts us under the influence of governments and corporations more than ever.
Yet we are all prisoners here of our own device. The only winning move is not to play this game. Easier said than done.
A few years ago I removed Slack and email from my phone, realized I was conned into thinking I had to always be available. I have a cell number for true emergencies. Then I got rid of social media. Eventually I got a dumb phone. I'll keep divesting over time. I will probably either leave or get ousted from tech due to so-called AI; AI makes it not worth it anymore. I signed up to work with computers, not tell a r3t@rd3d demon to work with computers for me. I know that's not a popular take, but who cares. It's not because I don't want to learn new things. It's precisely BECAUSE I want to learn new things and keep my mind my own. I'm willing to lose money if I can retain what's left of my soul. I'm willing to be left behind when everyone else is headed off a cliff.
There is still a little boy deep within who retains his rosy view of tech where tech exists in a confined space and doesn't invade every aspect of our lives, but the world never wanted that vision and will never go back to reclaim it.