In the days when the internet had just received tools for communication between ordinary users (FIDO, ICQ, web forums), we discussed news, musicians, technologies, games online. A computer wasn’t available to everyone, and even fewer had a modem connection and a setup for communication. Therefore, there were practically no “lamers” online.
Since then, the internet has changed a lot. Politics has entered, and practically everyone today has a connection to the internet and the ability to change the world in a few clicks on a mobile phone screen.
Unfortunately, the situation with the coronavirus has shown that most people are not ready for the free distribution of information. If there is censorship on television, then information is freely distributed online and perceived as the truth. Typically, people who receive information trust it and share it without checking its reliability or analyzing it. Yes, we’re talking about fake news.
Take, for example, the recent hype and fear-mongering fake news about the vaccine-chip and remote control. How can this be explained technically? A liquid microchip, a SIM card, a battery, and a charging slot? You can only see this in fiction, and yet people believed it. Just as they believe in the Battle of Psychics, Kashpirovsky and his charged water, a flat earth, Vanga, and so on.
As a result, we have the two most influential sources of information: television and the internet.
Television claims that red is brown, and the internet claims that red is black. And there is no middle ground here. Because, both outlets are beneficial to certain people. In the internet, it is fashionable to deny television, on television, it is fashionable to deny the internet and all the phenomena that occur in it. And ordinary people suffer, those who are not able to analyze and verify facts.