The Old Internet

“What was it like growing up without the internet, Dad?” Ivy asked her father one night as he tucked her in.

“You know we still had the internet when I grew up, right? In fact, I got to see the internet being made.”

“What was it like, Dad? I hear people say it used to be better,” she kept probing.

“I wouldn’t say better, but your mum might disagree on that one.”

“You didn’t like the internet?” Ivy inquired.

“No, I did. I loved it, especially the early days where people could make anything they wanted.”

“Like TikToks?” Ivy interjected.

“No, before that. You’d be browsing the internet and stumble upon some random guy’s blog, where he was talking about building a new kind of electric motor in his garage.”

“That’s so cool!” Ivy said.

“I know!” he replied, grinning at his daughter’s interest in his story.

“And back then people did it because they wanted to share something with the world, not for followers or likes or ad revenue.”

“So why did they do it?” she asked.

“I think they just wanted to be part of something bigger. Maybe some had knowledge they wanted to share, and others were looking for a sense of connection or belonging. Back then you could get to know someone online—I feel like that is much harder these days.”

“So what happened? Isn’t that kind of how the internet is now?”

“Kind of. It was weird for a while though.”

“What do you mean?”

“Instead of just regular people like you and me, big companies like TikTok, Meta, and Google took control of the internet.”

“If you wanted your family and friends to see stuff you made, you had to give it to one of them. They even controlled how you searched for things online. It got so bad that even going to most other people’s websites would send information to these big companies. For a long time, it seemed there was no escape.”

“That sounds scary. I don’t think I would have liked the old internet.”

“The really scary part is that most people didn’t seem to care. They could watch some short videos for entertainment and be happy with life,” I said. “I think I felt differently about it because I was a web developer.”

“Did you work for Google?”

“No, I didn’t work for any of the big companies.”

“So you don’t have to be sad, Dad. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“No, I didn’t, and when I could, I tried to stand up for the users of what I built. But I still feel like I could have done more.”

“I saw it all unfold in front of my own eyes. Heck, Google got rid of one of their company values—‘Don’t be evil’—that in itself should have made us do something. But what could we do against a giant company like that? They controlled search and built the browser almost everyone used.”

“We knew how it worked. We knew that browsers were letting users be tracked across sites, and we did nothing.”

“It’s not your fault, Dad. And maybe things needed to get worse so they could get better. Didn’t you say people used to be on the internet all day? That had to be bad for you.”

“Ivy, once again, you can be so insightful,” I replied. “It is heaps better now, but it frustrates me that we didn’t get here by learning—we got here because people hated AI and got bored of short-form content.”

“Dad, what’s short-form content?” Ivy asked.

“It’s like watching a film, but it’s less than a minute long.”

“Haha, it can’t have been a very good one then,” she snorted.

I laughed. “No, they were pretty bad.”

“No matter how or why it happened, I’m glad the internet is a much better place for you guys growing up.”

“I used to worry about you guys putting your email address into any website that asked for it. But today, people are barely online at all.”