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The Internet Is Broken — But Not Beyond Repair
How to Take Back the Internet
It turns out that humans can do amazing things with technology, like build the Internet.
But can they also do amazing things with cooperation, like agreeing to remake an Internet that many are increasingly considering “broken”?
Is the Internet broken?
One recent article described our current Internet like this: “We’re living in a slowly degrading echo-chamber of AI, ads, and profits.”
Strong words, but the author of that story went on to describe many of the problems with today’s Internet:
- Massive amounts of misinformation;
- Advertising everywhere;
- “Armies of politicized and automated bots roam the wilds of its social media landscapes.”
Others have focused on different aspects of a broken world wide web, including the domination of the online space by corporations driven solely by profit motives, the wholesale sale of users’ personal data to any buyers who want it, and “manipulative algorithms” that only feed users’ digital addictions and serve them content that only solidifies extremist viewpoints.
