The problem with the internet

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Internet is one of the greatest inventions of recent times. It has revolutionised the way we learn, communicate and collaborate. It has also provided us with endless entertainment options that were not possible before. While all that sounds great, the internet is not without its problems. Here in this article, I will discuss the problems with the internet and how it creating the exact opposite problem it was supposed to solve. 

 

From too less information to too much information

 

There was a time when finding information was difficult, if you wanted to clear your doubt about something you had to ask someone who you trust is knowledgable enough to answer your queries or you had to manually search written documents, which was, of course, timeconsuming and cumbersome task. I wonder how people dealt with their curiosity back then, like how do you know the height of Eiffel tower if you ever had such a question. 

But now the internet is creating the opposite problem it is supposed to solve. Instead of too little information, we now have too much information, and the problem is only going to get worse day after day. In future, it will be as difficult to get the right information as it was in the pre-internet era, all thanks to increasing fake and misleading information. Most news articles shared on Social Media are either completely fake/misleading or over-exaggeration of simple events. 

 

From Factual News to Clickbaity Headlines

 

The Internet has changed the news industry for worse. Newspapers before the internet were simple, The most important news was in front page with big headlines. What information should go on the front page was often decided by professional editors not based on web analytics. That has changed now since more people are now consuming news over the internet than ever. Now news aggregators and websites can track which news post has generated most clicks and can prioritise news posts which generate more clicks. 

Now news agencies focus more on news that entertains people rather than what is important. That's why we will see gossips about celebrities on the first page of the website and the real but uninteresting issues like global warming would be deeply hidden somewhere. 

 

From Liberty to Surveillance

 

World's largest Country by population has a massive firewall called The Great Firewall, through which they control what part of the internet people can access. The Chinese government controls what information their citizen can share and publish. They track every activity done online. 

Since the internet is the preferred way of communication/media consumption whosoever controls the internet will be able to control the minds of the people. It is not that the government didn't control access to information before the internet, earlier they did by banning books / arresting people who were writing against government, but our reliance on the internet has made it so easy for them, now all they have to do is simply block the website at the click of a button. Nowadays, shutting down the internet effectively means shutting down people's voice. 

Never in history, it was this easy to do mass surveillance on people. Never in history, it was so easy to suppress the voice of people.  

 

Surely, the Internet is a very powerful invention. It has transformed the lives of people like never before. At the same time, it has the potential to be more destructive than nuclear weapons. While we have all sorts of safety measures and restrictions in place for misuse of nuclear weapons, we can not say the same about the internet. But as they say, with great power comes great responsibility. Are we ready to manage such a powerful intension yet? Are we using such a powerful invention responsibly?