126: We're on the Highway to Hell

This week we are talking about the so-called utopian promise of the internet, the "information superhighway" as it was once known, and how it has, over the last thirty years, transformed into an information superhighway...to HELL. We look at some predictions and early ideas about the internet from the 90s before considering the critiques brought by Astra Taylor in the 2010s regarding the way the internet had been subverted by corporate interests. We also look at Lawrence Lessig's analysis of a "free culture" vs. a "permission culture" and how the internet has very much been made to resemble the latter. We conclude with a brief discussion of John Perry Barlow's "A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace" from 1996 and what it perhaps fails to consider.Lastly we think about the implications of all of this as we experience the rise of a similarly transformative new technological paradigm, AI and Large Language Models.Clinton Administration plans for the "Peace Dividend" in 1992Time Magazine in 1993 predicts the future of the internetAstra Taylor at Democracy Now on the Subversion of the Internet by AdvertisingLawrence Lessig's Free CultureA Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace by John Perry BarlowSend us Fan Mailhttps://www.instagram.com/theendoftheworldwms/https://youtube.com/@TheEndoftheWorldwMS?si=xmj-2e0s58JdN8-Bhttps://linktr.ee/endoftheworldwithmichaelandstu