I disagree. That would feel like going back to the year 1999
That would be absolutely glorious.
We probably need a better filter. I stopped using fb years ago, same for twitter. No regrets
What the Internet has lost in terms of mystique and pioneering freedom, it has gained in terms of utility and convenience, IMHO.
The main reason I would like to go back to 1999 would be because I would be 20 years younger :)
Maybe I've got a bad case of the "back in my day", but I feel more and more that "mystique" is what makes life worth living.
Watching a lot of movies from the 60s-90s recently, it's striking how much more effort we needed to put into everyday life back then.
Want to meet a friend? Call their number, hope they're home and arrange a time. Want to watch a movie? Drive to the video store and hope they've got what you want. Out of food? You're driving to the nearest restaurant, no Uber Eats. Want to find out the median rainfall in Fiji? You're waiting for the library to open and digging through a stacks of musty old books.
Nowadays, everything's instantaneous - you want something, you get it. We've lowered the bar for almost everything.
If consumption and enjoyment no longer require any effort, doesn't that devalue the entire experience? What does that mean for life in general? Don't you think that humility comes from knowing the effort required to know or acquire things?
This is an interesting perspective, surely. But the premise for reducing effort in some areas, as has always been the case with economic growth, is that we can focus that same limited effort on exploring new horizons, standing on the shoulders of giants, living in paradises of dreams past.
Look to the stars, for they will never limit your ambition.
I think you mean that you enjoyed the first years of the Internet after it became known to the general public in 1993.
The first year of the Internet was 1969.
Added in anticipation of a nitpick: some writers like to reserve the word "Internet" to refer only to the period after the great switchover to Internet Protocol in 1986, but it was the same hosts hosting the same services (e.g., mailing lists, FTP sites, Netnews and Telnet) before and after the switchover.
I also find it puzzling. Then again, as with cults or other bottom feeding fads and the increasingly ubiquitous, various and sundry addictive mires and dark patterns, to avoid the trouble in leaving, it is best not to enroll in the first place.