The heady promises of the 90s, w.r.t to the internet, and how it would bring greater openness and understanding, came to nothing, and gave us the dystopian social-media-verse we live in today.
But this is less surprising when considering a similar count of optimism, roughly a century ago this year, about radio.
Here is a look back at a NYTimes editorial from 1923, on “wireless telephony“:
Mr. William Dubilier, a “pioneer-expert” in wireless telephony, has said: “By 1950, isolation should be a thing of the past.”
Throughout the world, not only the leading or intellectual classes, but also the individuals of each nation should soon become better acquainted, not only with the mass characteristics, but also with the individual characteristics of other nations; and as mutual comprehension is thus extended, so, too may be more and more propagated the knowledge and the principles which must underlie any permanent system of universal peace.
Abacus Noir 