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Technology

Bulletin: The Net Isn't Dehumanizing! 113

Posted by JonKatz from the busting-stereotypes-big-time dept.
Relax -- You're human. A UCLA study has seriously debunked concerns that the Net has dehumanized America. Nearly two-thirds of Americans have ventured online, and a significant majority deny that the Net creates social isolation. Parents say their Net-using kids don't suffer poorer grades, and almost everybody says the Net connects them to family and friends in a "positive" way. The study has other interesting findings about Net use. You might want to commit it to memory.

The results of this study contradict years of short-sighted, phobic reports to the contrary, but you probably won't see them on the front pages of your local paper, or see the study leading the evening news. "The Net is neither isolating nor dehumanizing" would make a lousy headline, and a worse debate soundbite. George Bush won't add this to his "Dark Hearts and the Net" riff, and Gore and Lieberman won't cite it in their anti-"cultural pollution" or stop-the-video-game campaigns.

You can find the study, which was reported by the Associated Press, in the tech section of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune site and a handful of sites and papers here and there.

The findings shouldn't be a huge surprise to Net users, but it ought to come as a huge shock to the rest of this country's grown-ups. More than 75% of the people polled said they don't feel as if they're being ignored by relatives and friends as a result of chat-room activity. In fact, the majority of Net users said e-mail, Web sites and chat rooms have a "modestly positive impact" on their abilities to make new friends and communicative more with family.

If stupidity, hysteria and ignorance were crimes, lots of journalists and polticians would be calling lawyers about now. There are few more widely propagated stereotypes than the idea that the people reading this column are isolated and alienated from other humans as a result of the time they spend online gaming, squabbling, yakking and programming. The study is overdue, but it's probably small comfort to the people who've been berated for the perils of spending time online for much of their lives.

The study surveyed the opinions and online habits of 2,096 respondents -- both Net users and non-users. More than 70% of parents said their children's grades are neither helped nor hurt by Internet activity. Nearly two-thirds said they now buy less from traditional retailers, as opposed to shopping online. Lack of privacy was the biggest concern of the Net users surveyed, who said that few fear the government watching them, but most fear invasive corporations tracking their behavior. Curiously, the study was funded by the National Science Foundation as well as AOL, Microsoft, and the Walt Disney Corp. Officials of the Pew Internet and American Life Project were quoted as saying the report supports their own findings that the Net is a tool that unites more people than it isolates.

The UCLA study has other interesting findings: 66.9% of Americans use the Net; 54.6% use e-mail. More than 86% of Americans with college degrees use the Net regularly; 78.7% of adults say children in their households spend an appropriate amount of time online. More than 70% of adults say the grades of kids who use the Net don't fall. The top five Net activites? Web surfing or browsing, 81.7%; E-mail, 81.6%; Seeking hobby information, 57.2%; finding entertainment information, 54.3%.

Oh, yeah: 75.3% of Internet users say they never feel ignored by other people because of the Net. This is a good survey to print out, store in your computer or print out and put in your wallet. Unfortunately, you still need it.
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Bulletin: The Net Isn't De-humanizing! More

Bulletin: The Net Isn't De-humanizing!

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  • Re:An Anthro View (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I personnally hate most people I meet in public, since most I meet are egotistical assholes whom desire nothing but sports, drinking, and sex.

    Read what you just wrote. Read it. You personally hate most people you meet in public. Yes. You are deprived. You should see a doctor. They can provide you with the proper medication to stop hating those around you without escaping to a fantasy world where you can solve all your problems by typing /bye.
  • Doom, Quake, ..., hell, Rampage (take that young whippersnappers!). Tom and Jerry Cartoons, Uncounted Friday the 13th slasher flicks, exposure to guns at an early age...

    Hrm.

    I did all that and I'm not violent. Maybe it's because I had parents who actually raised me instead of having the TV, the school district, the internet, etc. raise me.

  • I have a friend who is deaf and he is in a unique situation. He lives in a small Nebraskan town that doesn't have many other deaf students like him, making it very hard to communicate. Right now he's a sophomore in High School, but I remember when he was in middle school.

    I talked to him about it, and he was having a very difficult time making friends and communicating with them. He would go to dances and events, but couldn't socialize with other students since they didn't know sign language and using the interpretor was ackward. (Usually a 40+ year old person.)

    I tried to help him out and find ways for him to communicate. The best way I could find was to use the internet. In this meduim, nobody had to know he was deaf. It wasn't an issue. He used IRC, ICQ, AIM, Yahoo Messenger etc. He began to make friends, and lots of them.

    He started to play games with people he met on the internet. He'd play StarCraft, Quake, Civilization, etc... He was able to socialize, have fun, and make lots of new friends. It really help him out and his self esteem.

    Then something great happened, he started to make friends with some of students at his High School. He met them through StarCraft and Quake and they'd begin to play the games on the Internet every night. He'd talk with them all night and have a great time.

    This was just awesome. I was so glad to see it happen.

    But, then he came to me with a problem. He now spends all his time on his Internet connection. He goes straight from school to his PC. The world only really meets him through his online presence. He never meets these people in the real world. Now 2 years later, he's told me that he's addicted to the internet.

    I guess my deaf friend is struggling to communicate everyone else and found a way. At first, this was a gift from heaven. It let him make friends and sociallize. But now he's become dependant on the internet and doesn't know any other way to make friends. Now he feels trapped and wants to make real friends.

    Its a tough situation, and I know he'll find a way to make the friends in the way he wants, eventually. He's a great kid.

  • Self-Reported Data is Suspect (Score:4)

    by MoNickels ( 1700 ) on Thursday October 26, 2000 @05:50AM (#674320) Homepage
    Most of the conclusions presented in this report and others like it depend on data that itself depends upon the subjects determining causal relationships for themselves. How accurate will data gathered from self-reporting respondents be? A subject claiming to be unaffected by net use and external data proving her to be unaffected are two different things.
  • Actually, I first read the thing on the MSP Star Trib. While it was actually written as an AP story and hosted on www.nandotimes.com, it's wrapped in the Star Tribune web site's look and feel and linked directly from their tech page. The article is at:

    href="http://www.nandotimes.com/cb/st/technology /story/0,4626,500272468-500425074-50265699 0-0,00 .html

    and it is linked from the tech page at:

    http://www.startribune.com/technology/

    make sure you remove any spaces /. puts in the URLs.

    LetterJ
  • Nonsense, it's credible because it says what we want to hear!

  • What I completely don't get... (Score:4)

    by ceo ( 6176 ) on Thursday October 26, 2000 @06:18AM (#674323)
    is why there's all this hand-wringing about the Net supposedly leading to social isolation etc. etc., yet you pretty much never hear people whining about television having these effects. When you consider that the Net can involve actual social interaction and TV pretty much by definition can't, this is...odd.
  • Note who paid for this study: AOL, Microsoft, and Sony. The results are very much in line with what those sponsors want to hear, which is that the 'net is good for you.

    Note also that this study did not attempt to measure any objective indicators at all -- it asked people if THEY thought the Internet was isolating or dehumanizing them, and they didn't. But people are notoriously poor at objectively evaluating their own lifestyles & circumstances. Ask some smokers if they think that smoking is having a negative impact on their health: they'll tell you it isn't, and they'll be wrong.

    I don't personally believe that the Internet contributes to social isolation, but I don't think this study is very good evidence in support of this position. It looks to me like an attempt by MS, AOL, and the other big boys, to generate some nice factoids for their PR departments.
  • The net gives an opportunity for the messed-up weirdos of the world to show their faces in "public."

    They were all doing that before. The net just changes their audience.

    In fact, it makes them easier to ignore; instead of having to walk around them on the sidewalk or try to avoid them at work, now you just delete and filter.

    -
  • Man, I'd rather have that rapist taking to my sister from across the country than have him outside her window though... :)

    I dislike talking for anything other than basic friendship on-line anyway. The whole idea of cybersex bugs me... "Oh yeah, that makes me hot." Bah. Say it to my face (or wherever), and maybe I'll believe you...

  • The US isn't all that different from England. In fact, it's been my experience that you see far more difference between socio-economic classes than you do between US and English citizens. In other words, a professional in the United States is apt to have more in common with his counterpart in England than he is with the blue collar worker down the street. They may follow different sports, drink a different beer, read different magazines, and what not, but once you get past that they're a lot alike.

    Sure, you still have small town communities with a certain take of the world, but that's got more to do with how they live than the country they live in.

  • Typical silly Katz (Score:3)

    by FallLine ( 12211 ) on Thursday October 26, 2000 @06:00AM (#674328)
    Feed the groupthink! One survey suddenly proves the internet is harmless? Puuuhlease. You know this was partially funded by corporations that just happen to have a vested interest in the results? Now I'm not saying it was rigged, but you guys can at least be consistent. Ignore it like you would any other corporate funded study.

    This survey probably wasn't rigged, but come on. There are lots of ways to get the wrong results on a survey like this. Firstly, it seems as if most of the test only "asked" people if they felt like they were being cut off. Well, I don't know about you, but very few people with problems with admit that they have it (even to themselves). Secondly, the internet has only made itself into America's living room in the past year or two. Don't assume that just because it's got a huge market share now, that all those users have been using the net with any regularity for a significant amount of time. Thirdly, I believe Katz and this survey quoted about ~75%, that's still a significant percentage who are reporting problems. That remaing ~25% could be all over the map, maybe 1% with serious problems. Fourthly, because this study is so broad, you can't ignore the fact that most of the users are so new that it's unlikely that they'd have problems even if the internet were known to be harmfull in extreme. In other words, this doesn't mean the internet hardened geeks of the world that have been using it for years have nothing to worry about.

    Maybe this is going a little too far, but I believe you'd see similar numbers if you were to introduce alchohol and do a similar survey. Do you feel you're an alchoholic? Of course not. Do you know anyone that's become an alchoholic after only moderate use? Similarly, most people who drink alchohol don't abuse it, but some do.

    It's clear that the internet offers undeniable benefits, even some social ones (i.e., to communicate via email with friends). It may be very positive on the aggregate, but I am convinced that there is also a significant bad element in it. I am convinced that excessive usage of stuff like slashdot, IRC, ICQ, IM, etc are going to be a real cause of tension in relationships and what not in the coming years. I've seen enough of it first hand to know that it's there. Anyways, the point is this survey has done nothing to dissuade me. Katz is wrong to trumpet it like it means you can just scoff at any criticism.
  • Our world has a habit of blaming the effects rather than the causes. We have created such "dehumanizing" tools because that is what we desire - the fact that we DESIRE these things is the real problem. Well, maybe. Another way to look at it is that the Net et al is not dehumanizing in itself - but society has created people that want to dehumanize each other.

    But all in all, the real problem is that we are living in a world where technology is growing rapidly and our ethics are dropping. We can't stop the growth of technology (which is what these idiot politicians seem hell-bent on trying to do) - and even if we did, we would only be stopping an effect of a more powerful cause - soon, something else would pop back up (kinda like a game of Whack-A-Mole). We need to fix the cause of this behavior - so ALL WE CAN DO, realistically, is try to raise our ethics to match it. I'm involved in a proactive group of people who are trying to do just that - many of us are geeks, but all of us want to change the world.

    If anyone wants to help, or has any interest in what we're trying to do, feel free to email me. I'd love to chat with any and every ethical geek, and the world needs all the help it can get!
  • Then thank God.

    If configuring and installing IRC is some huge task that is beyond the average idiot - then I say keep it up!

    I use IRC mostly to chat with my friends, most of whom live in another city. It is convenient that they are IRC junkies, but it is something that binds our group together. I also use IRC to check on the debian project.

    I've found mailling lists are the source for my hobby info, not IRC.
  • My sister, who is now a freshman in high school, goes home and sits at the family computer every day after soccer practice. For her, the computer has replaced the phone (or in many cases, added to it, since she'll also talk on the phone). Luckily, I've set up a home network so that we can all share an ISDN connection and still use the phone. Now, instead of talking for hours with one or two people at a time, she'll spend hourse with sometimes as many as eight or nine open AOL instant messenger windows talking with friends. In the social network of 15 year old girls, I'd guess that she's a major node. I doubt anyone would ever claim that the net is dehumanizing her.


    -------
  • i know a married couple or two that has met online, and they seem happy enough. as for myself, although i'm quite the hacker, meeting
    members of the opposite sex is still one thing
    that i prefer to do in meatspace.
  • I'm afraid that's what it's like. Grew up in rural Wisconsin. Living now in Boston, when I head home for one reason or another and I see old classmates, I realize that I have like NOTHING in common with most of them. I'm disgusted by pickup truck driving, beer-from-a-can swilling small towners. I know it sounds a little elitist, but I think the 'net has contributed to my personal evolution. I think and converse about things that I never would have been touched on if I never had left. The small town mentality...stifles one. Without the 'net, I don't know that America would have been my "land of opportunity."

    Dirk

  • I don't know how many fat people I hear saying that they don't know why they're fat. "I don't eat too much." Many alcoholics insist that alcohol isn't their problem, ditto drug addicts and drugs, etc.

    Why is this relevant? The whole thing was about surveying people's opinions. I know at least half a dozen co-workers who go home and surf their home internet kiosks until it's time to sleep or turn on Star Trek. Repeat until dead. And it's like digging a tick out of a long-hair to pry some of these people off their systems and get them to join the lunch crowd for some face time. Even more fun to get them to speak more than a few sentences.

  • Simply because most people believe that the net has had a positive effect on their social interaction doesn't necessarily mean that it has.

    From the article:

    More than 75% of the people polled said they don't feel as if they're being ignored by relatives and friends as a result of chat-room activity.
    - and -
    More than 70% of parents said their children's grades are neither helped nor hurt by Internet activity.

    They didn't just ask net users if they thought they were adversely affected. They asked friends and family of net users if they were being less social. That's a lot more objective. Wouldn't the net users social group be in a position to judge?

  • Okay. What makes this study any more credible than the several other reports [nytimes.com] that contradict it? Because JonKatz says it's right?
    --
  • Assuming that you're speaking from an American perspective, is that really what it's like over there?

    Here in England, pretty much everyone discusses quite a wide variety of things, we still have 'national debates' where a certain meme has made it's way into public and people discuss it pretty much anywhere. The cannabis debate has been the last one recently, the worth of the European Union is always ongoing. Sure people talk about football (*soccer*), but it's not limited to that.

    Perhaps it's because there's a lot of us crammed in a small country together, and probably due to the multi-cultralness as well. There's not that many places left here where you can find the small-town mentality.

    Well, here is an example of the good benefits of the Internet, learning about different peoples cultures from the horses mouth, rather than filtered through TV and films.
  • They were all doing that before. The net just changes their audience.

    Maybe, but it took a lot more guts to break into an Apple II user group meeting, in person, just to argue that the Amiga was more powerful. Similarly, who would verbally assault a Windows user in a McDonalds? You see this all the time on the web, but in real life it's just dumb.

  • Exposes anti-social behavior more than anything (Score:3)

    by Junks Jerzey ( 54586 ) on Thursday October 26, 2000 @05:40AM (#674339)
    The net gives an opportunity for the messed-up weirdos of the world to show their faces in "public." Think about it: What kind of person does it take to violently argue the superiority of the Dreamcast over the PS2? Or KDE vs. Gnome? I'm not talking about technical nitpicking, but hardcore goofiness like posting phony (negative) reviews of KDE in order to boost Gnome, or posting slams at Linux every time a BSD story is posted. That kind of behavior is seriously messed up.
  • If stupidity, hysteria and ignorance were crimes, lots of journalists and polticians would be calling lawyers about now.

    No, the ranks would have been decimated long ago. These are hardly new phenomena.
    --
  • I think what keeps useage (and social isolation) down is the lack of community with a point...
    I've been part of what felt like real communities on the net before. My last two years of high school, I was a hardcore regular on the Subway [islandnet.com] a telnet chat server running Neil's Unix Talk Server [demon.co.uk], a GPL chat server that was remarkably easy for a newbie to configure. There were some nights when my long-distance girlfriend and I couldn't get a private room, it was so packed. Since the advent of ICQ and AIM, people have lost a lot of interest in telnet chatting, but I know those places still exist as tight communities.
    Now, I am not necessarily saying these CAUSE isolation (it's kind of a chicken-and-egg thing), but I just disagree with the idea that all online chatting is limited to LOL and 13/m/NJ.
  • They go for the easiest point of entry, like AOL or Yahoo chat. And who do they find there? Slack jawed yokels who can't get to IRC anymore than they could.

    No argument there. That got me thinking, though. Wouldn't it be great if Yahoo chat could have some kind of moderation? In Neil's Unix Talk Server, people are promoted to guards and admins, who can kick people off, or muzzle them, etc. Now obviously you'd have the d00dz who would get m0d and turn it into a big DOS....

    What if they had user-created and user-run public chats? In other words, I can create the "Mark's City of Brotherly Love" chat room, and anyone can access it, but I get to ban/muzzle anyone I want, and I get to give submoderator access to anyone I want, too.

    Yet another idea Mark will never implement.

  • I just disagree with the idea that all online chatting is limited to LOL and 13/m/NJ.

    Well, that is true, but what is the cost of entry for the privilege of hitting chats of this nature? Members of the general public are not going to figure out how to download and configure IRC clients, they're not going to seek out (or even know about) telnetting into MUDs, etc.

    They go for the easiest point of entry, like AOL or Yahoo chat. And who do they find there? Slack jawed yokels who can't get to IRC anymore than they could.

    Now, if you're the type who is fascinated by conversations that are mostly acronyms repeated ad-nauseum, you'll stick around. Otherwise, you'll beat it back to whatever you were doing before, thinking "Internet, huh? Real interesting."

    I don't want to come off as some sort of elitist snob, but I think that the advent of the commercialization of the net, combined with the influx of people who treat online communication as an extension of shouting at a football game, has made the Internet in general a far less interesting place to spend my time.

  • It depends on how you use it, I suppose (Score:5)

    by adjensen ( 58676 ) on Thursday October 26, 2000 @05:40AM (#674344)
    When I first got on the Web in 1995, it was more entertaining to "surf around", and I did spend a ridiculous amount of time doing that.

    In the ensuing years, however, the rise in commercialization of the whole thing has led me to limit my use to email with friends, information gathering and buying stuff.

    I spend about 1/10th of my work day on the net, and maybe 20 minutes a week when I'm home. It has not turned into the "television replacement" that was forecast a while back, and neither myself nor my nine year old daughter finds it all that entertaining.

    Chat rooms seem to be a wasteland of children and idiots constantly on with their LOL and BRB, and I can't imagine anyone finding that to be a great use of time.

    I think what keeps useage (and social isolation) down is the lack of community with a point -- it's one thing to go sit in a restaurant with friends talking, and quite another to slog through banner ads, only to find your communications inundated with the ROTFLMAO crowd.

  • Their methodology vs previous studies (Score:3)

    by outlier ( 64928 ) on Thursday October 26, 2000 @08:30AM (#674345)
    The UCLA study used a survey methodology, while the most quoted "Internet leads to depression" study conducted at Carnegie Mellon relied on a quasiexperimental design that involved studying the same people over time and measuring them using validated instruments.

    In this study people are more likely to respond in socially desirable ways. By analogy, an alcoholic may not be willing to admit that his/her drinking has negative effects.

    It's definitely good to see studies focusing on the fact that the Net isn't that bad (or is even, gasp, good), but we shouldn't give too much credence to this study in contrast to others. If we're interested in the truth, we should be willing to consider the fact that certain aspects of on-line life may not be very healthy.

    On a related note, for a thorough analysis of the importance of "social capital" see Robert Putnam's new book "Bowling Alone."

  • ...anyone who believes that the 'net has a positive effect on humanity has never seen goatse.cx or a Portman troll. :)

  • The one question Katz/survey doesn't seem to concentrate on is whether other people feel neglected because their friends/relative use the Net. I mean, do the people around, say, me, feel neglected because of the time I spend on the web?
  • Before BBS and Internet days, I wasn't a social person due to my articulation disability (unable to talk clearly). When I was introduced to Prodigy, BBS', and Internet, I became more socialable. The Internet helped me to communicate better and easier, become more productive, and have a happier life.

    When I hear my friends and relatives say that the Internet is making me not socialable, it pisses me off. I tell them that I don't socialize very well when speaking. :(

  • Or maybe it's telling us things we've already found to be true? I don't need a scientific study to tell me whether or not I'm a sociopath, thank you very much.
  • It's all well and good the there is proof that the internet isn't making us anti-social monsters.

    Big DUH folks.

    But how will this effect us? Will the politicains and the rest of america wake up tomorrow singing the praises of the Net? I doubt it.

    What we need is sensational stories about how the Net made me lose 30lbs or saved my cat. Stuff Ma and Pa Kettel will see on Dateline. Cause once Stone Phillips says it's a good thing we can all rest easier.
  • they didn't ask friends and family, they asked moms and dad what effect they thought it had on thier children. Because we all know that children can't be trusted to know this stuff on thier own. I couldn't find anything in there where it says they asked friends and family about someone, just that they asked that someone if they felt they were being ignored. This was hardly a scientific study, just look at who was funding it, people with a big stake in the future of the internet.
  • Example of the usual chat room.

    --
    [cuteygrl342] a/s/l???????
    [suprkewldude] hi how r u
    [L0VLYLADEE] i brb
    [xX_EVIL_Xx] DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE KABOOM BOMB NUKE DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE
    [cuteygrl342] evil u shood not do that
    [xX_EVIL_Xx] #$#@%@# DIE DIE @#@#$@##
    [L0VLYLADEE] im bak!!!!!!!!!!
    [suprkewldude] do u like nsync?????
    --
    Yes, I will agree that the majority of these things are dominated by 13-year-olds trying to be "kewl". However, I've made some of my best friends online. I'm very active in an IRC channel on Undernet, a group of motley geeks brought together by a similar interest. I am one of the ops on this channel (we have about 30 ops, maybe 20 of which are on every day.) When channel ownership changed hands recently, some of us ops handled an election for a new owner, some of us worked closely together with Undernet officials, and others of us thought of ways to make our channel a better place.

    The ops, and a few of the regulars, are a pretty close knit bunch of geeks...if a relationship sucks for one of us, the rest are supportive. We all congratulated our new channel owner heartily (one of our higher level ops was rewarded the level 500 by cservice.undernet.org) when we had our election, even those who had lost. We're all planning to get together at a Linux convention at some point. Some of us are even collaborating to make T-shirts.

    All but one of these people, I have never seen face to face; the one exception is my boyfriend (yes, real life, distance relationships suck) and we both frequent the channel. I don't know what most of these people look like. But we're still a close group, and some of the best friends I have.

    It's a great Linux channel; you'll get help on just about everything. Look in my user info to find out exactly what channel it is.

    In fact, I think they're my social life.

    That may or may not be a good thing.

  • I hear these people talking of chat rooms, I wonder if they mean IRC, or some sort of AOL/Yahoo thing.

    My experence with irc.slashnet.org and irc.opennetworks.org, as well as some channels on networks such as Undernet is that there can be very hight brow conversations on IRC. Sure, there are a great many morons on IRC, and some portions of IRC attract them (I would love it if someone could show me an intellegent person on irc.dal.net), but the same is true for Usenet. There are some parts of Usenet (such as comp.*) that are haunts for some of the brightest people on the net, and others, (most of alt.*) that is a wasteland of porn and idiots.

    In addition to that, I see the intelligence level on IRC getting higher. I attribute that to programs such as AIM that draw the lusers away from the more 'archaic' IRC.

  • Without the internet, people end up being hillbillies in their own right. They entertain themselves with common activities, that everyone else in the area enjoys, and hold themselves happy with just that. About the only time they sit and ponder is the 10 minutes they read the morning paper, or when Li'l Susie needs help on her US History homework.

    Everyone at work talks about the big game, or this teams defense/offense, and that fills up the lunch hour/breaks. But what about then the paper prints about how taxes are rising? Some people just sit at the table, and grumble to themselves, or with their spouse (who just nods and agrees). They can't discuss it at work, cause then they'd be looked down on for being a 'nerd'. They don't experience the fun of finding a website or discussion where they can find other people to discuss the issue with, and maybe learn both sides of the issue, broadening their awareness.

    But, alas, too many people will just sit in closemindedness, scoff at foreigners and their cultures, and make fun of anyone that they perceive to have an education or understanding.
  • But there are many places still like that, and not just in the South. Even here, outside Baltimore/Washington DC, things are so dumbed down. When people get around to talking about politics and the election, it's not about issues, it's not about what each candidate wants to do to our government, it's all about how one looks better than the other, one talks more clearly, this one is rude, that one is annoying, and God forbid that the debates cut into 'Who wants to be a millionaire', or else we'll have a revolt on our hands.

  • Thank God for this (Score:5)

    by Rurik ( 113882 ) on Thursday October 26, 2000 @05:39AM (#674356)
    Why? Because I met my wife on the internet. That has always been a big issue amongst my family. They're all small-town people, farm workers, with no use for a computer, and here their family member got swept up and married to someone he didn't even know. NOT!

    The internet supplements your life. It allowed me to find friends that weren't just about drinking, smoking, and football. It allowed me to spend my days hanging with the guys, then go home in the evening and have meaningful discussions about topics that I enjoy.

    And that's how I met my wife, as a friend on irc. Then we just decided to meet (2 hours apart), as friends, after talking for over a year. Then we continued meeting as friends every weekend til we began meeting as a couple. Then a year after that, we got married.

    Just because a majority of my friends that I enjoy are on the internet doesn't mean that I shut out everyone around me (which my family now believes). They just can't understand that when I go to family reunions, I don't want to talk about deer hunting, or college football, or how Michelle drove the tractor for the first time. I want to talk about life, psychology, why we do the things we do, where we are all going, and how to root a solaris box.
  • For my wife and I the Net keeps our families closer. Most of my family including myself have web cams on our pc's and use them to see how each other are doing and how big all the babies are getting instead of just typing back and fourth. But it also lets me meet new people (friends) that share the same interests/hobbies as I do. I am a volkswagon nut and have meet people online that come to find out live in the same town as I do. I have even met some dare I say IRL to help them with their beetle restoration projects. Without the Net I probably would have never met these people. I enjoy spending time on the Net, but I also like to spend most of my time enjoying life.

  • How typical. We automatically reject as invalid the results of research that criticizes our lifestyle and choices, and automatically accept results as valid from research which condones our current mode of behavior. With this sort of filtering mechanism, we are guaranteed to never have to change our views, morals, ethics, or lifestyle again. This is quite convinient for the pseudo-rationalists who populate the threads of Jon Katz articles.
    * mild mannered physics grad student by day *
  • Sorry folks, but you can't just grab one study and yell "this is how it is!" The Washington Post covered this same story, and in their write-up they mention how the findings by UCLA are in direct contradition to an equally massive study performed by people at Stanford earlier this year. Sorry Katz, but independent verification is still a requirement of scientific research.
  • IANAD

    I am not a dehumanized human.

    *runs*
    --
    Peace,
    Lord Omlette
    ICQ# 77863057
  • Thank you! Though your link will be old soon. I recommend http://www.ccp.ucla.ed u/n ewsite/pages/internet-report.asp [ucla.edu] as a more permanent link.

    I too was very saddened that slashdot columnists and nearly all the readers didn't ever talk about the actual study. They mostly talked about an opinionated posting based on a newspaper's version of a wire story, none of which had the courage to point readers to the real study.

    I urge journalists, and especially slashdot, to always point to the original source.

    Sigh.

    --Neal

  • ...its about the "debunking"...oh never mind. Some people are just to dehumidified to appreciate a silly post...
  • ..."too" dehumidified that is.

    Errm....perhaps I meant "dehumanized" as well?

    Oh well...
    ...I debunk...you debunk...
    DEBUNK DEBOP!
  • But don't you think they are more bold online? Whereas on the street, they need to worry about being stopped by police, parents, etc., while online there is generally very litle authority to intervene.
  • It would seem that the anonymity granted to users by the internet has harmful effects on people. "If you can't [be held liable] for your [words or actions] online, then [you] can do whatever [you] want" Seems to be the refrain of 12 year old net users around the world. That is not to say that anonymity is bad, but merely that 12 year olds who have no respect for that anonymity are.
  • I would agree with you there, but it can also cause problems for shallow people, once you do meet them in person, are they going to live up to your standards. I hate judgemental people, and the world is full of them.

  • I believe this is the study to which that Katz is refering [ucla.com]. His link to the Minneapolis Star-Tribune is a bunch of quotes, and not text written by UCLA.

    Katz, if you're reading this, all it took to get this link was typing "www.ucla.com" and following a link from their main page. Being the net savvy "internet culture" advocate you are, I'm suprised you didn't try this.

  • Questionable conclusions (Score:3)

    by D_Gr8_BoB ( 136268 ) on Thursday October 26, 2000 @05:43AM (#674368)
    Simply because most people believe that the net has had a positive effect on their social interaction doesn't necessarily mean that it has. It seems to me that before any realistic conclusions can be drawn about the matter, there should be an actual psychological study done which rates the net's effects based on actual evidence. It's just as logical to conclude from these findings that net use leads to denial as that it has no social drawbacks.
  • Just becuase you took one Intro to Psychology course 12 years ago, you're in no position to question Jon Katz and the collective wisdom of Slashdot. The minor trifling fact that the study is not on the Minneapolis Star Tribune website should not give you pause, or force you question the incredible depth of research that went into this story. Despite the fact that the only information we have on the study is the deranged ramblings of a probably confused AP reporter, you have no reason to question the validity of anything that Slashdot says, especially when what Slashdot says is so self-validating to so many of us in the geek community.

    It is painfully clear to me that without the social interaction of the net, I would never realize the existance of Penis Birds, Hot Grits, or even Natelie Portman. I would also never spend my valuable time trolling on web logs, like I am doing right now. In short, the net has been an incredible boon to both myself, and many of the other members of slashdot, such as Anne Marie.
  • That's great. However, neither of those URL's are links to the study! Instead, they are links to and article about the study. I long ago gave up trying to piece together what any study might have been about by reading the garbage that some poorly informed reporter managed to bang out a few minutes before deadline on a friday afternoon.

    Obviously, the internet has been a great boon to society. However, the truth is many internet "news" sites contain articles based on some half-cocked and poorly researched idea by some random author. Often, those articles are little more than trolls, posted to increase hits, or make the readers feel good about themselves (and increase hits). The odddest thing about this phenomenon is that it hasn't clued more people on the the fact that most "real" brick-and-mortar news sites have been doing exactly the same thing for hundreds of years.

    If you read this AP article and thought you were getting information, you have been trolled by a brick and mortar news source. If you want real information, go read the actual study.

  • In defense of hillbillies (Score:3)

    by clary ( 141424 ) on Thursday October 26, 2000 @07:35AM (#674371)
    I grew up in rural Kansas, and have some bona-fide hillbilly relatives. I'd like to defend them a bit, I think.

    "Yup," you sound a bit elitist, you city slicker! Nothing wrong with pickups or beer from a can, as long as it's not something icky like Budweiser. ;-)

    Seriously, I owe a lot to my hillbilly roots.

    I have a father who worked hard (in a steel foundry) for thirty years to make sure his children had every opportunity he could give them. I am trying to do as well for mine. Largely because of him, I worry more about carpal tunnel syndrome than steel dust in my lungs.

    I had a family and community which taught me basic values like honesty, hard work, looking out for your family and neighbors, etc.

    When I go back to my home town, I enjoy talking both to the beer swillers about their "mundane" interests. I also enjoy talking to those small-towners who are cruising the web and publishing web sites. I don't demand that you should enjoy both, but your "disgust" disgusts me.

    Jeff (a pickup-driving, suburb-dwelling, hillbilly with a Ph.D.)

  • Whereas the refrain of 12 year olds you interact with directly on the streets of your own home town seems to be:

    "[you]can do whatever [you] want."

    I mean really, the only thing more self centered than your average 12 year old is your average 13 year old. " We be bad, we be cool, we be the baddest, coolest that there every was."

    the internet changes nothing but the mode of communication.

    So now they're pulling pranks online, instead of calling stores and asking if they've got Prince Albert in a can, or setting fire to a bag of dog poop on your porch.

    It's just more of the same.
  • No, I don't. The key factor with the 12 and 13 year old crowd, the REASON they are, basically, punks, is that they DON'T worry about police, parents, etc.

    They've never been in trouble with the police and are just coming to the realization that they're big enough to " take " their parents.

    AFTER they get in trouble a few times they start to worry a bit, but they can't get in any real trouble because they have no rights or priviledges to protect.

    By the time they're 16 they have permits and licences that can be effected by behaviour, they've had a few close shaves, or actual altercations, with the authorities, and are beginning to get a glimering of the fact that they, personally, arn't the hottest, baddest thing to ever roll out of a womb.

    The phone provides anonimity and has for generations, hence the phone prank. Running away provides a certain prospect of anonimity, and has since the dawn of mobility in living creatures, hence the flaming dog poop type of prank.

    Then there's the fact that the average 12 year old is so clueless that they're pretty damn lible to to do dumb shit right to your face.

    Ask any teacher whether they'd like to teach 3rd grade, 12th grade. . .or 8th grade. You'll get about an even split on 3rd and 12th. Not ONE will pick 8th. Not ONE!

    For God's sake, go reread Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer. 12 year olds have been obnoxious, arrogant, egotistical little brats since the dawn of humanity and one of the key reasons for this is that they havn't figure out the NEED for anonimity yet. For that matter go watch a bunch of 12 week old kittens or puppies, same damn thing.

    It's Lord of the Flies out there, and the internet hasn't got a damn thing to do with it.
  • But don't you get it?

    The people that do 'net 'til they drop are not somehow being "destroyed" by a force they cannot control - they are doing what they want!

    This study made me think, too.

    I spend a significant amount of time online, and while reading this wondered if I was being "sucked in" to being a zombie or something.

    Before the 'net, I was a bookworm.

    So, has it REALLY made any difference?

    I'd have to say YES! Communicating with other people via the computer IS MORE SOCIAL than reading another Niven or Bova novel.

    I also enjoy it more.

    And, nobody that I know is going to argue that I'm "anti-social" - I go to lunches and barbecue with my family and spend plenty of time with my (very sexy) wife.

    -Ben

  • Most people (Score:3)

    by Icebox ( 153775 ) on Thursday October 26, 2000 @05:47AM (#674375)
    Most people aren't harmed by using the net but there will always be some fringe who are. Unfortunately, just like in other aspects of our live (guns, drugs, coffee), politicians and people looking for a cause to champion are going to support protecting that small population. They make emotional arguments about how some kid in some city somewhere was surfing the net and tunred into an idiot. People hear that argument and it is much easier for them to accept having their freedoms taken away in exchange for making sure that no more kids will turn into idiots. Kind of like in high school when you had to sit there and listen to the teacher explain how to multiply a fraction for the twentieth time, for some reason everything has to get dumbed down so that the weakest in the herd can keep up.

    The tough part is that because their arguments are so emotional these people are hard to combat. In public debate you really can't come right out and say "Sorry ma'am, your son is of weak mind" because that only adds to the emotional mindset. You can only try to hope that people can see through all the hype and use logic. The ability of the Jerry Springer show to hold an audience and continue to find people willing to appear on the show indicates that this isn't a strong point of the some folks.

  • > The people whom I know in meatspace, I did not really choose. I know them
    > because we both happen to be in the same place, met the same people, etc,
    > and it's all rather a haphazard way to meet people.

    Take that viewpoint to its extreme and you'd never deal more than very
    superficially with anyone whose opinions didn't largely reinforce your own.

    Most of us choose as friends people that aren't likely radically to
    challenge any major aspects of our world view, obviously. Also, the people
    we meet 'haphazardly' are often limited to those of similar socio-economic
    background since they're working in the same field, attending the same
    college, and so on.

    Personally, I value having to interact in real life with people I can't
    easily understand and in a lot of cases don't much like. I might modify my
    own opinions through random exposure to those of other people I'd certainly
    never actively have chosen to interact with, or at the very least learn to
    be more tolerant of a diversity of ideas.

    Online interaction can be equally eye-opening, and the irrelevance of
    physical distance might sometimes make it more so; but I think online
    communities can also exaggerate people's existing tendency to huddle
    into insular cliques that are self-validating but ultimately pretty
    stagnant.
  • For those of us who are born loners and who feel uncomftable in socialising in groups f2f, the net encourages us to socialise.

    Communicating in newgroups and chat rooms can be more socially motivating. No problems with egos or social status, no one can see if you're feeling depressed, looking ugly, overweight or like some anorexic stick insect.
    Who cares if english is a foreign language to you, everyone elses spelling is so bad on the net you just blend in...
    No one notices who or what you are, you are just judged purely on what you say.

    Take /. , you don't get flamed for being a newbie.
    If you say something interesting and contribute to the discussions, people listen. Hell even the trolls say something intelligent every so often.

    Essentially the net is the great leveller, it encourages greater communication.
    Stuck out in the sticks, no need to get depressed.
    Just get on the net and you'll find more interesting people than you'd believe

  • Should't that acronym be

    IANADH ?
  • Surely that depends on their personality...

    Some people are not very good at socialising face to face. So a Computer Mediated Communications medium such as IRC allows them to socialise more confidently albeit from within a different medium.

    It all depends whether you think f2f communication is necessary for our well being.
    With the increasing use of non f2f visual communications do we need 'real life' interaction ?

    As for those people who use chatrooms as a shield to hide behind are surely benefitting from technology not becoming a slave to it.
    If no CMC environment existed they would surely be MORE prone to drop out of society and avoid social interaction.

  • Just because a majority of my friends that I enjoy are on the internet doesn't mean that I shut out everyone around me (which my family now believes). They just can't understand that when I go to family reunions, I don't want to talk about deer hunting, or college football, or how Michelle drove the tractor for the first time. I want to talk about life, psychology, why we do the things we do, where we are all going, and how to root a solaris box.

    Judging by the way you talk about them, I too would infer that at you've shut out the people around you, at least partly.

    If you really "want to talk about life, psychology, why we do the things we do, where we are all going," why do you seem to have such contempt for the everyday events that are important to many people? Maybe Michelle driving the tractor for the first time meant a lot to her. Maybe deer hunting is important to Uncle Buddy. Is it really that hard to ask a polite question, listen attentively, and generally act like a decent human being? You just might learn something about "life, psychology, why we do the things we do, where we are all going."


    --------------------
    WWW.TETSUJIN.ORG [tetsujin.org]

  • However, unless information like this gets spread across the continent by major players in the news industry such as CNN, to many, were still just a bunch of NERDS. Kinda shitty if ya ask me. Contrary to this stupid isolation belief, I myself have met many people through my computer, many of which I have met in person and become friends with. I use the computer to chat with friends and family located all over the place, that would cost me hundreds of dollars in phone bills. I think the people that carry this stereotype about computer use are a bunch of morons paying a shit load of money on long distance. Then of course there is cybersex and prOn, why would I pay for it, when I can find soooooooo much of it for free on the net. I guess my point is this, the reason people spend time on line is cause it can save you alot of money while also being efficient and fun.


    Round the firewall,
    Out the NIC,
    Through the router,
    Down the wire,
    NOTHING BUT NET!

  • Re:It depends on how you use it, I suppose (Score:3)

    by UnspeakablyLisa ( 164362 ) on Thursday October 26, 2000 @08:43AM (#674382)
    I think that different people have different needs/usages for the internet depending on their situations. Personally, I am a high school student with a group of friends spread all over the east coast (and some scattered elsewhere). We form an online community through mailing lists, chats, and instant messages. We use the internet as a tool to create the community we are unable to do in person -- and we fully abandon it when _are_ able to meet in person. It's just another tool, like the telephone, and good for those of us who have friends elsewhere and can't afford very large long distance phone bills.
  • It also makes it harder to break up when you actually see what they look like...


    -- Don't you hate it when people comment on other people's .sigs??
  • Not to mention that old child-molster sickos could be chatting with your daughter, or serial rapists could be chatting with your sister...
    The net is full of dangerous people, and, because you can be whoever you want on the net, you have to be extra careful who you are chatting with...


    -- Don't you hate it when people comment on other people's .sigs??

  • Bush (Score:1)

    by BillyZ ( 169879 )
    Would someone PLEASE print a nice large font copy of thise report and THROW IT at Georgy dubuya?

    thank you.
  • Ah yes, let's build on that little anomoly!

    Ever consider that if people stopped saying how evil 'those damned kids' are that maybe they wouldn't be so evil? I know that for a few years I went through a period where everyone around me told me what an evil fuck I was for every little thing I did (Dungeons & Dragons is evil, your music is satanic, your clothes look naughty, blah, blah, blah). Eventually, after three or four years of being told what an evil son-of-a-bitch I was I started to believe it. Another few years of that shit and I probably would have been ready to go on a killing spree (as it was I only thought about how nice it would have been to kill my aunt and uncle and keep their kids from growing up with such fucked-up parenting, but I didn't do it. Damned shame too, their kids are now on their way to juvenile centers).

    Stop telling children they're evil scummy shit, and teach them how to respect others (and this sense of anonymity). And I am not a firm believer in the 'fuck you you little basard' method of teaching. Try something along the lines of, 'how about we try this'. You'd be amazed how well it works if you treat the kid with respect.
  • I wish there were more like you.

    I don't understand why this concept is so difficult. If all the kid ever sees or hears is disrespect, how are they ever going to learn respect? Contrary to popular belief, you are not going to teach a kid to respect you or anything else by constantly telling them they are idiots. Show them how much you respect them (and if you don't, then don't have kids. Please, the world is screwed up enough right now). If you can't respect them, how do you expect them to respect you?
  • yeah! you said it!

    the net also gives you the chance to talk to people you know form "real life" but its mutch too expensive (telephone, handy, ...) to talk to him/her for a longer time, you can do this in the net (irc, icq, and others) whatever youself want and as long as you want (in my country 10 hours internet costs the same than 12 minutes over handy or 1 hour over normal phone).

    i also enjoy to talk to people i have never seen before because if you dont know the other side, its much more interesting to talk to ?!!

    >...friends that weren't just about drinking, smoking, and football...

    thats another thing thats _realy_ good on the net.

  • ...that people are %100 honest about themselves.

    In other words, you do have to wonder whether asking people their opinions on an issue really "proves" anything. E.g.:

    In related news, a significant majority of individuals who consume alcohol on a daily basis do not fell that their alcohol consumption affects negatively affects their social life or their grades. Another survey of individuals who recently gave up drinking shows the opposite results...

  • Slashdot (Score:3)

    by blueg3 ( 192743 ) on Thursday October 26, 2000 @05:38AM (#674390)
    Hey! Reading Slashdot, half-empty, Kuro5shin, etc. has a very positive social effect... I get to talk to fu_man, Misfit, nebby... :-) Hey, what's all those green and brown things outside my window. They kinda remind me of binary trees...
  • No doubt about it! People that have short comings due to something will rarely have the ability to 'fess up' to their problems. How many alcoholics believe they don't have a problem? It's one thing to hear someones opinion, but a 'scientific' study rarely ever simply asks people how they feel (unless it's a psych study).

    While I've been using the net for probably the last 5 years I can't say that I've found much of the web useful, I use it as a tool for information uptake, not to supplement my social life.

    How do you think the authors of this study would handle the following situation:

    In our first year at university, our residence house (about 45 people) was hooked up to the school's T1 and we had a local network. Needless to say, we spent quite a great deal of time online, some of us more than others (It was sick in a way - I know people who would spend over 90 hours a week online without really doing much of anything constructive). Well, needless to say, it probably cut in on everyones party time, but the majority of people who spent all this time online failed that year. I'm serious, I can run off at least 5 of my immediate friends. While I wouldn't attribute their failure to the net, I would definately say that it supplemented their outlooks on wasting time, as well as preventing most of them from ever meeting anyone else in the residence community (probably not a bad thing - but I guess it can be considered as a social hindrance). The sad thing is that all of the people who failed would definately never say that the net had any negative affect on their lives, even though it was the main implement by which they wasted a year of their lives (from an academic standpoint).

    In the end though, I'd just like to add that I don't think the net is evil, the people using it are make their own problems. All I'm pointing out is that this study seems to be fundamentally flawed.

  • Re:friends (Score:3)

    by ichimunki ( 194887 ) on Thursday October 26, 2000 @07:16AM (#674392)
    The net is full of dangerous people

    No. It isn't nearly full yet. There's plenty of more room for perverts, sickos, and chimps on the net. In fact, I go whole days on the web/IRC/AIM/freechess/Slashdot without running into any obviously maladapted folks. Adding Usenet to the mix can quickly change that, but even then, staying out of certainly binary-centric groups seems to work well. I'm guessing that the internet is no more replete with the bad people than the average corporate office, shopping mall, post office, university, major league sporting event, or sidewalk.

    Finally, as far as your rhetorical sisters and daughters are concerned, I really think they have more to worry about from their friends and family than they do from anonymous strangers on the net. All of the feminist readings I've done and women I've discussed this with indicate that family members or date-rapists (and party-rapists) are far more to be feared than someone online.

    You don't need to be extra careful WHO you are chatting with, you need to be careful WHAT you are chatting about and HOW MUCH you tell potentially threatening individuals that may help them injure you (and to be aware of data about you that may be available which helps them fill in the blanks). Finally, although I have to say I wouldn't want my rhetorical daughter to be sex-chatting some old guy, I certainly would think that if I felt she had made the decision to do so in full awareness (and was old enough to understand the conversation), that such behavior was harmless. However, if that guy showed up my rhetorical house seeking that rhetorical daughter, he would be greeted with some rhetorically heated lead fired from a rhetorical shotgun and dumped in a rhetorical body of water. Rhetorically speaking of course. :)
  • This is such a basic concept it's stunning, but so many adults are so afraid of kids they can't do it. Certainly our candidates du jour have no clue about this, but at least some parents and teachers get it...

    I was very lucky to go to an alternative junior high program [hbwoodlawn.org] that was built around this assumption. Learned a ton. Would send my kids there in a second, if I have any.

  • The popular Western ethnocentric view of ones who do not confide by their view of normal behaviour as deviant or deprived is clearly shown by the vast majority of the public and social scientists. If one gains all social interaction from the net and meets there desires for social interaction by that medium, why oppress them by saying that they are being deprived of social interaction when they can fufill there needs by an alternative medium. I personnally hate most people I meet in public, since most I meet are egotistical assholes whom desire nothing but sports, drinking, and sex. While I desire and find mental stimulation in mathematics, programming, or generic logic problems of deductive reasoning. I find it difficult to attain my needs for social interaction through the common public so I persue other venues such as the Internet and occasional poetry reading at a coffee house to meet my needs. Since I do not go to parties or bars, am I deprived? I think if I was forced to go to parties bars, and other deficits of mental stimulation I would be truely depriving myself.

    Milk does the body good unless you do not possess the ability to break down lactose and then you have bloody diahreah Marketing Ignorance Since 1800
  • Chat rooms seem to be a wasteland of children and idiots constantly on with their LOL and BRB, and I can't imagine anyone finding that to be a great use of time.

    I can't completely agree with this.... I met my fiancee in a Yahoo chat room! (Yes, I know I'm probably the exception to the rule.)
  • Easy - the survey was probly distributed online. 8-) More seriously, they probly didn't survey in the areas where people were less likely to have computers. They were trying to prove a point, which was that net use doesn't damage people's lives. So they're not going to go to places where no-one can log in, they're going to interview upper/middle class, suburban neighborhoods, where everyone could afford to be on the net if they wanted. Statistics can be completely accurate without sharing any actual information. In this case, they did offer information - that of those with the financial ability to buy a computer and net access, or access to a public school/library with net access, a fair portion don't think it's hurt them.

    Remember, it's ~67% OF THOSE SURVEYED.
  • imho, meeting someone online is actually healthier than meeting someone for the first time irl. you can actually get to know someone before you have a chance to judge them by appearance.
  • i don't know about social behaviour, but my hair and teeth are falling out, and i'm bleeding from my eye sockets.
  • true, but if you meet someone irl and they're really attractive, it's a nice surprise... and there's way less pressure.
  • good point... luckily everyone can remain anonymous if they like, and unless you already know the person irl, and accidentaly met them online, you don't ever have to see them again.
  • also true... that's why it's important to be involved in your children's lives. and like anything else in life, a bit of common sense goes a long way. meet someone in a public place, never give your real name on the net, etc. etc.
  • How do you debunk a concern?

    --

  • Whatever the heck they are. If anything, the net has reinforced my short attention span.


    --
  • Not just video games, but actually buying them. Check out this ebay auction. [ebay.com]

    I bet if some of these bidders were put in a room to sort out who gets the 1 PS2, you'd see some real anti-social behaviour. =)


    --
  • Um, follow up to my previous post. See what's happening with PS2 sales [ebay.com]

    I'd like to see a study explain this. Before auto-post, I'll take into consideration:

    Remote buyers who wouldn't be able to get to a store

    Gatesian wealth that could care less

    Does the ease of use of e-auctions, access to credit and the absense of someone beating you over the head with a clue-bat leave a new class of people with an "auction-after" syndrome? What a rush; it felt like the right thing to do at the time; What've I done?; Oh sh!t how'm I gonna pay for that!


    --

  • cyber'ing doesn't even get mentioned in the top five, yeah, right.
  • Really. Too much or too little of just about anything is bad for you. Everything in moderation (not as in +1). I am sure that it goes both ways. The net has improved the lives of many, including mine. I am sure there are some people that the opposite is true for. It all depends on the person. IMO it is pointless to try to guesstimate (that is all these type of studies really do) how much better or worse off people are due to things like TV, the net, video games, etc. Children on the net need supervision just like when they are playing. I don't think problems arise due to the use of things like TV and the net. I think the problems come when parents use these kind of tools to babysit their children for them. I am really sick of hearing people blame things on tools like mass media and even guns, for that matter. How does the saying go? Guns don't kill people; people kill people. The problems lie in the irresponsible use (or lack of supervision thereof) of these tools.
  • Right now, I'm trying to write an essay on why the Internet IS dehumanizing. I had to go up to my professor's office for some food for thought. He gave me an excerpt from "The Gutenberg Elegies", and it was a refreshing uplift for my mind. He also gave me a due date extension so the essay is due on Monday, not tomorrow (woohoo!).

    In return, I'm giving him some screenshots of the Borg from Elite Force. He's never seen Star Trek, and I think that the Borg are the epitome of the idea that he is trying to convey. Meanwhile, he is reading this story from the Boston Globe.

  • The results of this study contradict years of short-sighted, phobic reports to the contrary, but you probably won't see them on the front pages of your local paper, or see the study leading the evening news.

    This won't make front pages, because the media will "bury" it, because there are far more important things out there to report. A look at my local paper mentions increasing building demolitions due to a population decline, Gore's first visit to my state in the campaign, ad spending by local candidates, and an insurance surplus for public employees.

    In other words, things the general public might actually give a damn about.

    If stupidity, hysteria and ignorance were crimes, lots of journalists and polticians would be calling lawyers about now.

    If they were... you'd be writing from Shawshank right now. (Speaking of which, is that prison still operating?)

    Any chance you could report on something, anything, without trying to vilify everyone who opposes you?

  • "They just can't understand that when I go to family reunions, I don't want to talk about deer hunting, or college football, or how Michelle drove the tractor for the first time."

    My God you said it all! I would have to say people that I know that aren't online and like to talk about deer hunting and stuff are the ones that are wacked! They have no perspective of how a balance of virtual/reality/intellict/fun can make life enjoyable.

    Or I could just waste my time away in Everquest believing I am really lvl60 Monk :)
    ---

  • Ye gads... (Score:4)

    by American AC in Paris ( 230456 ) on Thursday October 26, 2000 @05:59AM (#674412) Homepage
    Wow. Who'da thunk it? Society not being plunged into the depths of some Orwellian dystopia by the introduction of a powerful new communications medium?

    I mean, think back to 1453. Remember the chilling effects Guttenberg's printing press had on society? Suddenly, there were all these habitual readers, devoting dangerously large blocks of time to nothing but reading, completely ignoring such time-honored, socially recognized traditional activities as hard manual labor, angry mobbing, pennance, and feudal servitude. Eventually, society was so radically transformed that nobody from that period would even be able to recognize it today. It's a wonder humankind managed to survive!

    Looks like we've realy dodged a bullet on this one, thank goodness. I just hope that the research is right--imagine what might happen if the Internet were to have a similar effect on our society as Guttenberg's infernal contraption had on his own...*shudder*

  • It's nice to see some statistics coming out that support the real facts about the internet. But be careful not to misjudge in the opposite direction. John Katz and numerous others, instead of irrationally deriding the net often irrationally extol the wonders of the net (It'll increase the power of the people! It'll end politics! etc.) The net is neither totally wonderful nor totally awful. It's merely a reflection of the insides of society. You see there things from the real world reflected, neither for the better nor for the worse. So, when you next talk about the net, don't put it down, but don't tell everybody the net is a cure for cancer! It's no more good or bad than a telephone.

  • the anonymity granted to users by the internet

    Anonymity? There's no such thing on the Internet. Go back to RTFM and RFCs etc. You'll see how hard it is to trace users.

  • Re:Thank God for this (Score:3)

    by joshuaos ( 243047 ) <ouroboros@@@freedoment...com> on Thursday October 26, 2000 @06:41AM (#674421) Journal
    You make a very, very good point here...

    The people whom I know in meatspace, I did not really choose. I know them because we both happen to be in the same place, met the same people, etc, and it's all rather a haphazard way to meet people. On the internet, however, I can talk to people who have similar interests to me, and I can more carefully choose my friends. If I am an outcast in meatspace, and have no friends, there is a much better chance of finding people of like-minds in cyberspace, because the pool of people is so much bigger. I think this is an amazing and wonderful thing, and I think forums like /. are making a huge step in making the net what it can be.

    Joshua
  • the 'net is like any other TOOL...neither good or bad in and of itself. It all depends on the way the user uses it
    ============================================

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