It’s true, the Internet has been a technological revolution. It changed the way we do business, learn, and communicate. But has it eliminated teachers? Hardly. Sure, we may have fewer people in the classroom, but instead of teaching from a classroom, teachers make websites and videos. Has it changed the way government works? Not really. Government is the same as it ever was, though it has a website and an email address now.

I remember the nay-sayers saying that computers and the internet were going to make us all anti-social. That “virtual friends” were no replacement for “real friends”. But social media has become the next big thing on the internet and our social circles have grown because of it.

Libraries aren’t gone; they are just online. Newspapers and magazines — well, they aren’t gone yet, but they are quickly being replaced by special-topic blogs and other dedicated websites. And, unlike whatever search engine Stoll used, today’s search engines are quite adept at finding relevant information (despite many greedy companies’ attempts to thwart that).

Basically, the more things change, the more they stay the same. The internet has changed the world, but in many ways, it’s still the same world, just done differently.

You mean the same kind of bubble where we make kids learn how to read, write and do math? Technically that’s also a “false world bubble” and not natural either but is still needed in this day and age (and in the past).

“The true reality is that a planet of kids glued to computer screens and unable to function without a portable supplementary brain at their side is, in the long run, not healthy for anyone for a slew of reasons that should be obvious but apparently aren’t.”

I think you are a tad..blowing things out of proportion with that comment. True reality? Really? You mean…before the industrial age? Before agriculture? or when we were hunter gatherers in the ice age and our life expectancy with in the 20′s?

Also, what’s wrong with supplementation or tools? Have fun trying to get to work without a car, or not using any medical advances in the last 100 years and “keep it natural” if you get a broken leg, or any other medical mishap. I can show you as many ex. as you can that technology itself is enhancing and making kids smarter in a slew of different ways then without it.

“It’s like our industrial revolution- the “obvious” wisdom for a long time now has been that skills that get you far in this modern world are important, and archaic skills like knitting and farming are a waste of time.”

Basic skills will always exist and you’re missing the forest for the trees. Go to somewhere like instructibles.com. Many of those tutorials help someone, knit a sweater, fix a clogged sink, bake a pie, change a car’s oil. People HUNGER for learning new things, and not necessarily in a tech vein. Tech is just used to disseminate the info faster, easier, cheaper.

“I have no intention of raising a kid who only knows how to “learn” by watching a screen and hitting keys. Stubborn old luddite? We’ll see in a few decades.”

I concur. If all you think of technology is “Watching a screen and hitting some keys” I feel pretty sad for you.

Tech can a be a boon to education but it’s not a panacea. I would also teach a son to fish, fix a car, bake, fight, etc. I’m just not afraid of technology turning my kid into a zombie. ;)

It’s all good. :)

Oddly enough, it’s hard to find any of those articles online.

I, on the other hand, have unsent letters from 1991 hyping my friends on the net. I told them that eventually everybody will be on it anyway, and you’ll be able to buy every book, album, or whatever in the world at the best price… “Yeah, whatever, you crazy nerd.” I wanted them to get email accounts because I was pretty good at writing letters, but I sucked at getting them mailed. That’s why I still have them. Ah well.

Anyway, I read Silicon Snake Oil when it first came out and I just recently reread it. I have to say, he’s definitely cranky in it but he make a ton of great points that hold up today. Over the past few years I’ve donated a ton of time getting computers working in my kid’s school and I have to say I walked away VERY anti-computers in early school experiences.

http://www.ted.com/talks/clifford_stoll_on_everything.html

Worth watching.

http://www.google.com/search?q=battle+of+trafalgar+date&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&client=firefox-a&rlz=1R1GGLL_en

You might say Google fixed it.

As for his argument about the Internet’s uselessness for sex, saying “And who’d prefer cybersex to the real thing?”, clearly the author did not consider the vast population of people who have difficulty getting laid in real life. Not that I’d know anything about that.

Hollywood was taking its fanciful liberties again in the film by showing colorful pages with huge images. Pages that would take ages to download on a 14400 baud modem.
Six months later, the Internet caught up to the Hollywood vision, and then surpassed it.

With a major advancement being announced and deployed every two weeks at the time, things were moving so fast, it was impossible to make any accurate predictions into the future further than a few weeks.

And as such, a lot of people were also scared. With no one really at the helm controlling all of this, the Internet was a very disruptive technology that could turn a lot of things on its head for better or worse.

But now that the internet is spelled with a lower case i, we can all sit back and have a good laugh about it all.

I even bought a jigsaw puzzle for a friends birthday that I used to have math games with. They sent it mostly assembled, so I got to ‘disassemble’ it. I did also get him a completed bottle, to help guide him.

Even if you have no intention to buy one, the website is hilarious. Google ‘acme klein bottle’.

2. A Western Engineering Consortium meeting I was at in the same general time frame.
A media exec present said the Web was a “fad” that would pass, and only be used by the fringe.

I offered to make a bet with him for $10,000 that would not be the case. He declined:-) I then pointed out the same had been said about silent movies, radio, movies with sound, and TV. Wish I could remember the guy’s name since he was so far out in the weeds.

It’s always a disappointment when “experts” are unwilling to acknowledge their own potential, or inevitable, obsolescence in the face of the future.

“I Roll With Stoll”