For me, a tiny human whose brain is still not done developing the internet just... Is. It has always been. And the fact that it changes gives me the same feelings as my hometown changing, or my elementary school. It changes. Everything changes with time.
Social media is really the only thing I've considered opting out of or using differently. I just don't understand how only a few hours after making my profile picture my actual face I've got dick pics in my inbox from a random account, how can they find me so quickly ? When it comes to everything else I feel like I can still use the service the way I want to while just being more careful but with social media you just kind of have to either change how it's being used or opt out entirely.
The Internet stopped feeling as utopian to me as it did when I started using it when Friendster and MySpace and, the nail in the coffin, Facebook took off. What was great about the Internet was that no one knew who or what you were in the real world, you were only known by what you had to say about whatever the topic at hand was. The Internet went from freeing you from any kind of identity to tying you more tightly to one. but that happened a long time before what this article is about.
I never had a Friendster or MySpace account but still do have a FB that I have not looked at in months. I have been amazed at LinkedIn's data mining capabilities. As one "good" example", even though we had not talked in 25 years and have no mutual friends, it recommended a connect to my first serious girlfriend which was nice even though it said we had 2 mutual friends who she did not know. No fucking idea how they figured that connection out. On another note, I happened to remember a schoolmate who I did a project with once and that is about it and so I googled her. Soon thereafter LinkedIn sent me a recommendation to connect even though I do searches like that in Incognito. It sniffs my google searches and gmail for sure. And being able to see who looks at my LinkedIn profile is kinda weird as well.