Are Corporations Using the Internet to Accelerate Our Cultural, Political and Economic Decline?

[link to www.alternet.org]

Maybe the internet isn't the panacea it's made out to be -- Hedges argues it has been hijacked by corporate interests and it's destroying our society.
The Internet has become one more tool hijacked by corporate interests to accelerate our cultural, political and economic decline. The great promise of the Internet, to open up dialogue, break down cultural barriers, promote democracy and unleash innovation and creativity, has been exposed as a scam. The Internet is dividing us into antagonistic clans, in which we chant the same slogans and hate the same enemies, while our creative work is handed for free to Web providers who use it as bait for advertising.

Ask journalists, photographers, musicians, cartoonists or artists what they think of the Web. Ask movie and film producers. Ask architects or engineers. The Web efficiently disseminates content, but it does not protect intellectual property rights. Writers and artists are increasingly unable to make a living. And technical professions are under heavy assault. Anything that can be digitized can and is being outsourced to countries such as India and China where wages are miserable and benefits nonexistent. Welcome to the new global serfdom where the only professions that pay a living wage are propaganda and corporate management.

The Web, at the same time it is destroying creative work, is forming anonymous crowds that vent collective rage, intolerance and bigotry. These virtual slums do not expand communication or dialogue. They do not enrich our culture. They create a herd mentality in which those who express empathy for "the enemy"--and the liberal class is as guilty of this as the right wing--are denounced by their fellow travelers for their impurity. Racism toward Muslims may be as evil as anti-Semitism, but try to express this simple truth on a partisan Palestinian or Israeli website…

…"Funding a civilization through advertising is like trying to get nutrition by connecting a tube from one's anus to one's mouth," Lanier says. "The body starts consuming itself. That is what we are doing online. As more and more human activity is aggregated, people huddle around the last remaining oases of revenue. Musicians today might still be able to get paid to make music for video games, for instance, because games are still played in closed consoles and haven't been collectivized as yet."

The internet is creating an accelerated race to the bottom. Our lowest common denominator is beyond comprehension. Deny the BORG!

The internet is a bubble. It will pop when our real lives collapse around us. When we are too stupid to solve our most basic societal problems. When our personal lives have rotted from neglect. When our kids are to stupid to function on their own. When we have become an Idiocracy.

[link to en.wikipedia.org]