Last night I had a long, agonising nightmare about popup ads. Well. Amongst other internet horrors. You know them all, probably. And it was the worst dream I've had in years (because I don't have bad dreams), so I decided to do something about it upon waking. I spent a good deal of the morning scanning my system for spyware and viri (?). Had both, which shocked me. I've never knowingly had a virus before. There's a first for everything, I suppose.
And I was reading things like this, and I was thinking.
A lot of the appeal of the internet, for me and many people, is the relative anonymity. I never took it upon myself to be someone I wasn't, as was possible, I simply saw it as more of a license to be myself. Look into anything I found interesting. Say things I wouldn't bring up in the real world. And I'm increasingly finding this to be...incredibly stupid of me.
As far as looking things up, the net's wonderful. It has more information than I could find in most places about many things. Books are better, of course. More reliable, amongst other virtues, but finding the books themselves can be made much easier with the internet. And I don't know what I'd do for music without the internet. I mean, it's even how I find out about the majority of local shows. I'd never see live music without it, and never hear most of my favourite bands without it.
But. Everything is monitored through cookies. And it's insignificant, but when they come back with random popup ads for those things... I'm perfectly capable of finding things on my own, thank you. And with more efficiency. At least in stores or libraries you can say, 'Nono, I'm finding things just fine.' And then they aren't pitching specific books at you. This is one of the main reasons I don't watch tv, and now the internet is just becoming another marketing medium. The content sometimes seems like the songs on the radio: just fodder intended to keep me there long enough to see the ads.
And I understand the necessity of some of it. But not the adware bot bullshit. (I have only vague ideas of terminology. I'm not a techie at all. Excuse me.)
It also bothers me a little to think that people know enough about what I view to send me ads. Makes me feel dirty. At least in the real world I can grab a book, head to a corner, shoo away salespeople or workers, and have no record of what I saw outside of my own memories.
There's more anonymity in the real world, in other words.
And then there's the communication issue. Aie.
Lately I've been annoyed by how the internet tends to bring out the worst in people. It seems to make people more prone to argument. The perceived anonymity seems to serve as a shield. People become much more cruel than they would ever be offline. And it doesn't particularly bother me, most of the time. I expect it. But it seems a bad thing to expect, especially since you know people wouldn't say these things in the real world.
And it annoys the hell out of me when people act differently between the online and offline world. I do this as well. I say a lot more online than I do offline. I have moods in both venues, and the differences are swiftly narrowing, but they're still there. Mostly I talk about things online for which I'd face negative repercussions offline. I don't talk about food or weight offline. I don't talk about my moods offline. That's it. The rest is out there. Mostly, I talk online because I know no one here can medicate me, while offline that's an entirely different matter. And places to vent are good.
I'm getting offtrack.
The point: I'm finding the internet less and less useful. Even with music, it's becoming less necessary. I know where the bands worth seeing play in my area, the shows are cheap, it would be simple to just show up and go, or check their schedule through means other than the 'net. It would be simple to sign up for offline zines. It'd be harder to find out about bands that are local to other cities than my own, and that don't tour very far, but. Well. I don't really need to know about them anyway.
And music is the thing I use the internet for most. Everything else is secondary, and incredibly easy to replace. I would miss people by leaving, and that is my main motivation for staying. I'd miss reading some diaries. That's. That's all, really.
It's a helpful resource, but it's nothing like a utopia, and I can't figure out why I spend so much time online.
The real world is safer, in a lot of ways. There, you can always start again simply by moving. You can ignore people as easily as you can block them on AIM. I just...think the real world has a lot more options lately.
I guess I'm finally disillusioned enough to actually seek out the world. So this is probably a good thing. It does feel rather distasteful though, to tell the truth. I waste so much time.
revoless.
12:15 p.m.
August 08, 2003.
Listening to: No Knife.
A thought, a day, and a dream or A truncated weighted-up style entry