'What is the internet?'

Paul Miller, writing for The Verge:

Since I don't "use the internet," according to my dial-up definition, I'm frequently longing for my friends to "disconnect" from it and spend more time with me throwing frisbees — because what could possibly as important on this ephemeral internet that has them so wrapt? But if they "disconnected," what would we talk about? Probably about someone who just friended them on Facebook, or this great new idea for a website they had, or this well-reviewed restaurant — "wait a minute, let me look it up" — that we should hit up later. And at that restaurant we'd eat food that a chef probably emailed to another chef, and then pay with internet-verified credit cards, and then take cabs home with embedded screens flush with internet-obtained or distributed information. Or go see a movie in theaters that was delivered in digital form over the internet. And then we'd go home and listen to music we bought on iTunes at some point, or that was originated by band members who met on Craigslist.

[...]

But the internet has disrupted everything, and it would be ignorant to try and cut it into infographic slices and point at the disruptor parts and the silly distractions. It would be as useful to legislate thought crimes and doubleplusgood lines of reasoning.