02-22-2019, 07:34 AM
(02-21-2019, 02:19 PM)David Horn Wrote:(02-21-2019, 01:15 PM)Bill the Piper Wrote: The mainstream media seem to think there is a generational boundary around 1995. Now even Pew Research agrees. Why?
If gen Z really starts in 1995, a new turning would have to begin in 1998-9, and I don't see it makes sense. Even 9/11 did not make that much of an influence on people's daily life, as the social media revolution and financial crisis of late 2000s.
I agree that this dividing line is arbitrary, but it fits the general assumption that generations are shorter than the S&H generations we use. The sorting criteria are different, so the results are different too. What I find missing is the difference in character that should accompany the generational change.
Internet Explorer did not have an effect upon children too young to use it except perhaps to distract adult attention from children because they became too 'busy' surfing the Web.
I see the Internet not changing life much except to facilitate what people already were doing before the Internet or had a proclivity to do if they got the chance. Communication? People were writing letters. Shopping on Amazon? They were shopping in brick-and-mortar stores such as Borders and Tower Records that no longer exist. Research? People were going to libraries to do research. Even something so sleazy as looking at porn on the web? They were relying upon magazines and 'dirty books' before that.
So it is a virtual world? Well, so is the book and the magazine.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.