this post was submitted on 30 Oct 2023
174 points (97.8% liked)

Asklemmy

44152 readers
1980 users here now

A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions

Search asklemmy ๐Ÿ”

If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!

  1. Open-ended question
  2. Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
  3. Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
  4. Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
  5. An actual topic of discussion

Looking for support?

Looking for a community?

~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_A@discuss.tchncs.de~

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
 

Some news that would be completely mundane today but scary or shocking in the past.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[โ€“] mrbubblesort@kbin.social 24 points 1 year ago (3 children)

That I have a device that fits in my pocket and can connect to almost anyone else on the face of the planet, as well as tell me any fact I'd like to hear, or any story I'd like to experience. And it does all this about as fast as my thumbs can type out the request.

[โ€“] Carighan@lemmy.world 22 points 1 year ago (5 children)

And yet 99,9% of the time you just use it to get into arguments with people you don't even know.

[โ€“] mrbubblesort@kbin.social 8 points 1 year ago

No you don't! /s

[โ€“] deus@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago

The rest of it being ads, I assume

[โ€“] optissima@possumpat.io 3 points 1 year ago

What do you think they'd also do with it? They were already getting in arguments over mail with people they would never see nor hear.

[โ€“] AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It's also a universal translator, the device they thought would facilitate diplomacy and peaceful communication.

[โ€“] mindbleach@sh.itjust.works 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Paraphrasing Douglas Adams: "If you stick a Babel fish in your ear you can instantly understand anything said to you in any form of language. By effectively removing all barriers to communication between different races and cultures, this has caused more and bloodier wars than anything else in the history of creation."

[โ€“] tetris11@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 year ago

Tears of the feeble, hands of the slaves
Skin of the mothers, mouths of the babes
Building a Tower, belongs to the sky
When the whole thing comes crashing down
Down ask me why...

[โ€“] andrewta@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago

And the government uses it to spy on you. Businesses use it to spy on you and gather basically all of your personal data. Privacy has been dead for a number of years now. A hundred years ago people would have rioted.