Gee … I thought Al Gore invented the Internet. Today I read in USA Today that he didn’t. Who can you trust anymore?
See for yourself, read what USA Today has to say.
I always like reading about how the first embryonic ideas driving innovation move from childhood to adulthood. It is disturbing to some that things like pornography are behind some of the best electronic innovations. Our desire to point to altruistic over hedonistic motives is based in part by our natural storytelling formulas: good wins over evil, the nice guy gets the girl, or pick the one you like best.
My wife Susan bought tickets to Les Miserables and of course I had to attend. I knew the basic storyline and I tried to warn her that it ends very badly. Spoiler alert if you have not seen it … everyone dies in the play. I know it is deeper than that, but work with me. You do get my point. We all like happy endings to our stories.
Despite all the bad actors on the Internet, few would debate the overall good it has enabled. It is an information superhighway. It does still present huge opportunities for the future. And, unfortunately, along with that come all those “bad guys” taking advantage of all too many.
The news media of course feeds on scaring us all with things that do go wrong. But, let’s not lose sight of the opportunities to make the world a better place through technologies.
For those of you with a few minutes to spare, I found this TED talk on altruism very interesting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uq-6T6TAu74&feature=youtu.be