Fear And Anxiety Accompany Forced Internet Unplugging

H

HardOCP News

[H] News
Joined
Dec 31, 1969
Messages
0
Fear and anxiety? Yeah, that sounds like me every time the internet goes out. ;)

It's fairly common knowledge that Americans have a serious dependency on the Internet. But according to a new report released today by Tata Communications, that dependency is accompanied by some intense psychological and physical repercussions.
Click to expand...
 
I feel like my life is over whenever the power goes out in my neighborhood.
 
Alastair Reynolds and other sci-fi authors saw it true.
 
Internet goes out I can't do half my job so, yeah, tiny bit of anxiety there.
 
Not hard to see why, people use the interenet for many thing sthese days.

News source
Entertainment
gaming
communication.

Don't let them classify it as a utility no, it's not like poeple use it over phones or businesses depend on it or anything.
 
I do internet tech support.

People get themselves so would up and become such big assholes you cant help them because they want an absolute commitment written blood with your personal phone number and address that you will fix them BEFORE everyone one else because they are more important.

Oh and they want it fixed now.

I have business customers calling me all day long that dont know what their account number is, where or what the modem is and it is my fault I dont know how to pull them up -- and dont hassle me by asking for an address.

If the idiots would pay the attention bill along with actually paying the internet bill they wouldnt have most of the problems they do.
 
Last month I stopped by the Wave Cable office here in Washington state. I was gonna drop off an old cable modem I had. There were like 50 cars in the parking lot and a line building down the road, so I parked across the street. I went into the office and there was a dude who was yelling at the lady behind the desk at the top of his lungs totally freaking out because his internet went down. Something had happened to the Wave Cable network and everyone went offline. It was down for about 4 hours but I bet that time was total hell for the people in that office who had to listen to everyone freak out at them.
 
I've thought about this situation before. A couple of weeks ago, I didn't have access to my computer. I had to use a friends computer for important emails but other than that, had to rely on the TV. Was quite different but didn't feel any withdrawals. In fact, I found some new TV shows that I never knew existed.
 
Zarathustra[H];1041133029 said:
I understand restlessness, but fear? Anxiety? That seems a little over the top...
Click to expand...

Have you ever seen video game addict withdrawals? Apparently there are certain facilities that deal with this exact issue believe it or not.
 
I remember being made fun of in high school when I was overheard talking about computers to a friend. Now everyones on suicide watch if the Internet goes out for a few hours.
 
Zarathustra[H];1041133029 said:
I understand restlessness, but fear? Anxiety? That seems a little over the top...
Click to expand...

I remember reading news about people calling the cops because Facebook was down. Now imagine if you removed all their access to twitter, instagram, etc as well.

I think people are too dependent on being socially connected online all the time, that without the internet, it would be like being locked away in an isolation cell.
 
Anxiety? Being out of (electronic) touch is fantastically relaxing!
 
Kueller said:
Anxiety? Being out of (electronic) touch is fantastically relaxing!
Click to expand...

It feels like an adventure, all of a sudden those old ass candles you bought become useful once again, if it's really long you have to go camping in the backyard with a propane stove or the BBQ grill. Quite fun in fact.
 
At first there is panic that you have no forums to troll. Then peace washes over you while you watch the blinking lights, it's very zen, until the last one finally goes solid as if it's the Stargate completing it's dial out. A fire in your belly starts, the troll is reborn.
 
Once upon a time, people worried about starving for lack of food, some still do.

Now, people get their panties in a bunch because their internet goes down.

Maybe what people need, is some perspective...

BTW, classifying internet as a utility and regulating it as such would destroy innovation and what little competition we have now, and create a worse monopoly on service that would happily never upgrade the infrastructure just like the power and water companies who are still using 40+ year old gear they inherited from the former private owners...
 
I can't wait until the day when heroin is considered necessary for people and they demand it be defended as a utility and human right and paid for by government.
 
Tata Communications? Peoble probablly get the withdrawls from the porn sites they cant reach hosted on Tata networks ;)
 
Whenever there is a service interruption for any period of time, I just lay in my bed and stare at ceiling...
 
mavrocket said:
BTW, classifying internet as a utility and regulating it as such would destroy innovation and what little competition we have now, and create a worse monopoly on service that would happily never upgrade the infrastructure just like the power and water companies who are still using 40+ year old gear they inherited from the former private owners...
Click to expand...

Bull.

Classifying something as a utility in no way limits creativity. In fact it promotes real competition and innovation to improve services for people by preventing abuse, and truly making the ISP's fight for their customers ethically, rather than through backdoor secret deals and deception.

Besides the argument is simple. Many things formerly classified as utilities currently are distributed over the internet, so logically the internet must also be a utility as it now carries those utilities.

The "no regulation is good regulation" argument simply does not hold water. The only people that helps is the abusive fat cats at the top. It is great if you want another guilder age, not so much if you want true innovation resulting in societal improvement.
 
Zarathustra[H];1041133931 said:
The "no regulation is good regulation" argument simply does not hold water. The only people that helps is the abusive fat cats at the top.
Click to expand...

And this itself is another bullshit argument. Regulation is not a black and white issue. You cannot claim that a lack of regulation ONLY helps one group, any more than you can claim that regulation ONLY helps one group. Both options give power to giant entities. The primary difference is that the government is a combined entity, where corporations are more spread out. Both cases can help consumers, but in different ways.
 
Stiletto said:
And this itself is another bullshit argument. Regulation is not a black and white issue. You cannot claim that a lack of regulation ONLY helps one group, any more than you can claim that regulation ONLY helps one group. Both options give power to giant entities. The primary difference is that the government is a combined entity, where corporations are more spread out. Both cases can help consumers, but in different ways.
Click to expand...

Fair enough, but if we limit the discussion to Internet, and classifying it as a utility, my argument still holds.

Furthermore, lack of regulation, resulting in a wild west type business market very much tends to favor those already with abundant means over those without.

Regulation in general is there to protect the people from the problems of unchecked capitalism, where incentives arise that are not inline with the the betterment of the condition of man and society as a whole, but I guess there have been instances where it has been abused.

I have seen some misguided regulation on occasion, but by contrast almost 100% of the deregulation I have seen has been misguided.
 
If I had a girlfriend, I would not care if I could not access the Internet.
 
Anyway, moving back to the topic at hand, since so much of our entertainment has become dependent on having an active internet connection, I can definitely see how a period of outage can be a restless and boring one.

The internet is where I get almost all of my television/movies, almost all of my news, where I do most of my non-face-to-face communication with friends and family, where I play my games, where I do all my reading and research, etc. etc. so it stands to reason if it goes down, I'm going to ahve a ot less to do. Very understandable.

If you get to the point of Anxiety and Fear then you have a bigger problem. Some sort of addiction I guess.

I imagine this is related to the same issue that always comes up in the texting while driving arguments, which discusses the human brains hard wiring to have an insatiable and irresistible appetite for social networking and texting, to the point where no law or education on the matter can really be effective in preventing texting and driving. If something so fundamental to our nature is pulled once a person has become used to it being present, it might be problematic for that person.

Those of us who grew up before the internet (or at least before social networks) probably have an easier time dealing with it

That being said, I recently played my first game of "Cards against Humanity". It did not require an internet connection, and it was a great time!
 
I get far more anxious when the power goes out, personally. There's a lot of offline entertainment I have inside my home that could keep me distracted for several days without issue, but most of it requires power to work.

These people freak-out if you take away the internet? That's bonkers :D
 
Stiletto said:
I can't wait until the day when heroin is considered necessary for people and they demand it be defended as a utility and human right and paid for by government.
Click to expand...

Go to Europe.

Unlike the US (in the idiocy of congress) heroine is prescribe able for people with serious pain problems. Morphine has limits on how much you can take and how much will work. Heroine can go much higher. For people with terminal cancer, spinal fractures etc.

There are also harm reduction programs I've read about where addicts can go get their fix at a government shop. Apparently buying heroin is cheaper then paying more police officers to stop the crime prevented because Johnnie doesnt need to hold up the liqueur store or bream into your house for money.
 
Kueller said:
Anxiety? Being out of (electronic) touch is fantastically relaxing!
Click to expand...

Different people react differently.

I think a lot of it is age related too.

If you are younger, and grew up with social media always on, I can imagine that having it turned off would be troublesome.

Personally I fall somewhere in between. I like being connected, I don't find being disconnected relaxing, but I would hardly say fear or anxiety is what I'm experiencing.

More like a combination of boredom, and frustration that I can't immediately look up information to answer every little question that pops into my head.

Then again, I am an indoorsman, true and true.

I enjoy a short walk outside, but other than that, to me, nature is something best enjoyed through my windshield. I hate the beach, don't much care for the sun (other than its life giving properties) and relax by spending quality time indoors, often with an electronic device of one sort or another.

You couldn't pay me a billion dollars to go on a camping trip.
 
Stiletto said:
rWGIY1l.jpg
Click to expand...
QFT
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top