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what fact about our current world would freak people out if it were a newspaper headline a century ago? (lemmy.eco.br)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml
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Some news that would be completely mundane today but scary or shocking in the past.

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[โ€“] 24 points 2 years ago (3 children)

That I have a device that fits in my pocket and can connect to almost anyone else on the face of the planet, as well as tell me any fact I'd like to hear, or any story I'd like to experience. And it does all this about as fast as my thumbs can type out the request.

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  • [โ€“] 22 points 2 years ago (5 children)

    And yet 99,9% of the time you just use it to get into arguments with people you don't even know.

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  • [โ€“] 8 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Heh, you vastly underestimate porn.

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  • [โ€“] 7 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    It's also a universal translator, the device they thought would facilitate diplomacy and peaceful communication.

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  • [โ€“] 6 points 2 years ago* (1 child)

    Paraphrasing Douglas Adams: "If you stick a Babel fish in your ear you can instantly understand anything said to you in any form of language. By effectively removing all barriers to communication between different races and cultures, this has caused more and bloodier wars than anything else in the history of creation."

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  • [โ€“] 6 points 2 years ago

    And the government uses it to spy on you. Businesses use it to spy on you and gather basically all of your personal data. Privacy has been dead for a number of years now. A hundred years ago people would have rioted.

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