I was fortunate to have the opportunity to be on the early Internet in college, when it was still just text based messaging and almost nothing else.
I would have a hard time giving it up, and envy the kids today growing up with this vast resource. I believe I have learned more on the web than all my schooling combined, including my college work. Most of it is practical knowledge, but I have also pursued areas of personal interest for knowledge’s sake, and done some refreshing of subjects I had forgotten.
I seldom set foot in a store or bank anymore, and I save a bunch of money. And then there’s the access to music and other media. Just amazing from the days growing up with 3 channels on a black and white TV and am/fm radio.
It can be abused/wasted like any tool, but if you take advantage of it with reasonable care, it can really enrich your life.
My wife and I were recently researching a biblical issue.
Referenced dozens of translations, bible dictionaries and other resources in a couple of hours.
Got to talking about what would have been needed a few decades ago to do a similar caliber of research.
Would have probably taken several days, access to an unusually high quality library, and the expertise to know where to look.
IOW, we couldn’t have done it.
We’ll probably be able to tell our grandchildren of our time using the Internet while it was still free, like during the “Wild West”. They’ll be shocked when we tell them of such things as 56k Internet, Napster, uncapped bandwidth, being able to start a website out of our homes, and unregulated free email. lol
My first ‘log on’ was about 1993-4. One of the several local BBS systems (Dallas-Ft. Worth area) had a portal to the Internet. Users could only use it for a few minutes at a time.
By 1994, Prodigy and some other services also had portals to the Web.
By 1995, local ISPs were offering dial-up services.
Ironically, a SWBell Telephone rep said they didn’t upgrade their phone lines because they figured the Internet was a passing fad.
I got my first cable internet connection in late 2002 in nwArkansas. It was a whopping 1 mbps.