For months, Google has maintained that the web is “thriving,” AI isn’t tanking traffic, and its search engine is sending people to a wider variety of websites than ever. But in a court filing from last week, Google admitted that “the open web is already in rapid decline” (with regard to advertising, kinda-sorta)

  • Hikki88@lemmy.dbzer0.com
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    3
    arrow-down
    13
    ·
    edit-2
    4 hours ago

    It was private at that time. My point is that it spread so quickly to millions of people worldwide because of capitalists specifically the telecom companies and ISPs stepping in. Without them, the internet could never have developed on such a scale.

    • Phoenixz@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      6
      ·
      2 hours ago

      No it wasn’t

      First connections were between universities. Tim Berners-Lee at CERN then came up with web pages to easier share information

      There was nothing capitalist about the internet back then

    • SmilingSolaris@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      11
      ·
      4 hours ago

      The telecom companies got paid by the government to do it, they just as easily could have paid themselves to do it but we as a society are allergic to the idea of taking money out of the hands of poor billionaires and their potential profits

      • Hikki88@lemmy.dbzer0.com
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        1
        arrow-down
        13
        ·
        4 hours ago

        That doesn’t undermine my argument that it was ultimately because of the capitalists that the internet spread in the first place.

        • SmilingSolaris@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          6
          ·
          3 hours ago

          It does undermine your argument though, because you are saying that it only spread because of capitalists. I’m telling you it spread because of government funding and capitalists were just the medium by which the funding was used. The capitalist part is replaceable and unnecessary.

    • despicable@lemmy.today
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      6
      ·
      4 hours ago

      And how would you know without the internet being developed under a different system at the time?

      • Hikki88@lemmy.dbzer0.com
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        arrow-down
        6
        ·
        4 hours ago

        That’s not an argument. I don’t need to speculate on hypotheticals when reality already proves the point.

        • ArmchairAce1944@discuss.online
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          41 minutes ago

          The internet would not have existed without government investment. Back when the idea of the internet was being floated around in the early 1960s the US government did contact every major telecom company in the country snd all flat out refused meaning the government had to publically foot the bill (and the work).

          No, capitalists would never, ever have invented the internet.