100 Things We've Lost to the Internet

by Pamela Paul, Lisa Flanagan (Narrator)

The acclaimed editor of The New York Times Book Review takes readers on a nostalgic tour of the pre-Internet age, offering powerful insights into both the profound and the seemingly trivial things we've lost.

Remember all those ingrained habits, cherished ideas, beloved objects, and stubborn preferences from the pre-Internet age? They're gone.

To some of those things we can say good riddance. But many we miss terribly. Whatever our emotional response to this departed realm, we are faced with the fact that nearly every aspect of modern life now takes place in filtered, isolated corners of cyberspace—a space that has slowly subsumed our physical habitats, replacing or transforming the office, our local library, a favorite bar, the movie theater, and the coffee shop where people met one another's gaze from across the room. Even as we've gained the ability to gather without leaving our house, many of the fundamentally human experiences that have sustained us have disappeared.

In one hundred glimpses of that pre-Internet world, Pamela Paul, editor of The New York Times Book Review, presents a captivating record, enlivened with illustrations, of the world before cyberspace—from voicemails to blind dates to punctuation to civility. There are the small losses: postcards, the blessings of an adolescence largely spared of documentation, the Rolodex, and the genuine surprises at high school reunions. But there are larger repercussions, too: weaker memories, the inability to entertain oneself, and the utter demolition of privacy.

100 Things We've Lost to the Internet is at once an evocative swan song for a disappearing era and, perhaps, a guide to reclaiming just a little bit more of the world IRL.

Genres: Nonfiction, Essays, History, Audiobook, Self Help, Humor, Technology

6 pages, Audiobook

First published October 26, 2021

About the author

Pamela Paul is the editor of The New York Times Book Review and oversees books coverage at The Times. She also hosts the weekly Book Review podcast. She is the author of six books, How to Raise a Reader, co-authored with Maria Russo, My Life with Bob: Flawed Heroine Keeps Book of Books, Plot Ensues, By the Book, Parenting, Inc., Pornified, and The Starter Marriage and the Future of Matrimony. Prior to joining the Times, Paul was a contributor to Time magazine and The Economist, and her work has appeared in The Atlantic, The Washington Post, and Vogue. Her next book, Rectangle Time, comes out in February. She and her family live in New York.

Reviews

[Joe Krakovsky · Rating 2 out of 5]

When I first saw "100 Things We've Lost to the Internet" on the shelf at the library, I thought that it would probably be full of cute nostalgia. How wrong I was. What I took away from this was that the author felt that what little we lost was offset by things being so much better now. I didn't agree, so I was going to give it a 1-star rating. That is pretty drastic, I know, but sometimes that is how books seem to be rated. It is not by literary merits but rather because of the emotions they bring forth in the reader. For instance...

If there is one phrase that makes me cringe, it is, "It is so easy, just go online." When I got laid off, I went to the unemployment office. Luckily it was a few weeks before the COVID outbreak. I could have "went online," but I chose to wait for one-on-one assistance from one of the fine folks there. Even though he didn't know me, he zipped through page after page of things that didn't apply to me, that I would have carefully read line by line in my ignorance, and still wondered if I filled it all in correctly. Afterall, I was dealing with the government.

The author praises the advantages of a cashless society. My rebuttal is that the Constitution calls for gold and silver as money for a reason. Even that fiat currency referred to as 'Federal Reserve Notes' says it is legal tender for payment so not accepting it is breaking the law. Sure, credit cards are handy, but Visa and Capital One wouldn't be around if it wasn't such a lucrative business charging interest to people who can't pay off their debt. I could just see a cashless society someday where a corrupt politician wakes up in the morning, and instead of selling one of his paintings to the leader of a foreign government, logs into his or her offshore bank and adds three zeros to the dollar amount in the account. Inflation is here and in spite of what economists are rewarded for saying, no inflation is normal or healthy for those of us veterans or elderly on a fixed income.

One thing I have to agree with was a quote she mentioned by Neil Gaiman. According to him, "Google can bring you back a hundred thousand answers. A librarian can bring you back the right one." One time I was in an online debate about drugs with someone. It was obvious that rather than speaking from experience as I was, she was merely listing links to support her argument. I thought, "You dummy, it is obvious that you have never worked in a pharmaceutical company, nor have you read 'Radium Girls,' where the author told how insurance companies used favorable (and now we know untrue) evidence from doctors that radiation didn't harm those exposed to it to avoid paying out to victims of radiation poisoning."

The author is also right about the loss of privacy on the internet too. Look at Hillary's email controversy. When she was trying to hide evidence, she not only had emails deleted but had the server acid washed. I wonder how her people made sure those messages that were delivered never saw the light of day?

All the while I was reading this I was thinking how, if such a person were in a movie, they would be the one that finds out her husband met someone online or her child was on the verge of suicide due to online bullying. In spite of claims of how everything your child does can be monitored; I have no doubt that today's youth could find ways around it if they really wanted to. These kids know their way around the digital world better than we do. Who do they want to hire for work in the computer world, somebody like the author or a 20-year-old? I wouldn't doubt that some of these kids can go into the dark web and find the right app to fool mom and dad. Raising your kids right and having a happy marriage is based on physical time spent with them and showing them that you love them and not by simply monitoring their computer usage.

In fairness to the author, it was easy to read. Many would agree with the author and enjoy it, so I will therefore bump my 1 star rating up to 2.

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

Again, deeply behind in my reviews here. My apologies.

"100 Things We've Lost to the Internet" is moving funny, astute, and awash in the Proustian Madeleines that anyone who recalls a world before the Internet will savor. (And if you are too young to remember that world, then you will view this as a brilliant explanation of why your parents miss dittos, and the wonders of a childhood of benign neglect.) It's about things, yes, (the phone in the kitchen), but what makes it such a beautiful and remarkable book is that Pamela Paul uses those totems to remind us of emotions and sensations that are now either forever transformed or forever gone (the power that came with a thick rolodex, and what that first rolodex meant). I loved this book: all carefully curated 100 chapters. Also? It makes a great gift. It is among the books I now give often to family and friends.

[Carey]

DNF at 21%

I went in thinking this would be a thought provoking meditation on the ways in which life has changed with the digital age, but it's just one self-indulgent rant after another. I myself am a baby Gen Xer - I remember a time before the internet, but it's existed for the entirety of my adult life.

I get it. Things have changed rapidly. That can be alarming or scary, but we grumble, adapt, and move on. I was already frustrated by the nostalgia in this book for things no one in their right mind misses, like getting lost, being bored, or wasting money on rolls of film full of shitty pictures you don't know are shitty for weeks or months.

But then we get to the school library and that is where I say fuck this book. Nostalgia for shushy librarians and silent libraries that acted as nothing more than moldering book repositories is gross. The library has evolved and is continuing to evolve into something better and more important than just a place to store books. I might not even be as pissed off about this as I am except that I was listening to the audio and the way the narrator spits out "media center" along with other newer terms for spaces that used to be libraries grated on me.

Nostalgia is a tricky thing. It often lies. This book wallows in it. I'm really disappointed because I wanted to like it so much.

[Anu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Before I review this, people should know that I basically spend my working hours researching on and thinking about how people use the internet. Sounds fun, I know, and it is, for a large part. But also, a common refrain among my friends and me is that the internet was a mistake. I mean, we usually say this in the context of hate speech or disinformation, which is definitely not what Pamela Paul talks about here.

I should clarify, that for almost all intents and purposes, I identify as a luddite. I study the internet, but I don't much use it. I broke my phone, completely shattered it, back in 2019, and I honestly was able to survive without it for quite sometime (I have a lesser phone now). Was it difficult to be an analogue girl in a digital world? Somewhat, yes, but not really. I mean, I knew which train I had to take to get to my office, and when, although I couldn't really know if the train would be late or early on a given day. And whilst I had to lug my groceries around because I couldn't access cab services or grocery services, it was something I had done in the past anyway, so it wasn't a big deal, really. Importantly, I realised, that nothing was really life-or-death anymore. I told my co-workers that I didn't have my phone on me, so I could only access my emails or Slack channels when I had my laptop open, and people were okay with that. I mean, it had to come to my phone completely being in pieces to go on a technology diet, but it changed me. Little bit. It made me stick to my guns about not responding to my emails everyday, all the time, even if I was not working. It made me more comfortable telling people that I didn't feel comfortable being asked to be available outside of working hours for non-emergencies. My time was my time, and what I did with it was my business. Phone, or no phone.

In the 1994 movie Before Sunrise , one of the characters asks what the benefit of quicker technology actually is, if we don't use the free time for something else, something fun. Everything is instant, but people are busier than ever. I don't really think I got the point of it when I first saw the movie, but I do now.

When I was younger, in school, I had to wait till I got home to tell my parents something important, or tragic. Or, if it was really an emergency, I would have to call their office or mobile phones in the lunch break only. That's just how it was. Even better, I went to high school before smart phones, so I could bunk off and do other things, and there was no real way to find it out or stop me. I think I almost got caught once, but I got away with it by lying about the bus being late. I genuinely feel bad for all the kids these days that cannot get away with these small, white lies. I mean, you have apps that can track movement, and bus schedules are on the internet, updated almost every few seconds.

In a world dictated by Encyclopaedia Britannica, I grew up on Dorling Kindersley. In fact, on a recent family vacation, I used my DK-gained knowledge to correctly explain the difference between a beam and a bracket (I am a political scientist, not an architect). In 2009, at a book exhibition, my brother and I successfully begged our parents to buy us the entire Encyclopaedia Britannica. It sits proudly on the top rack of our nicest bookshelf at home. Little did we know, the 2010 edition was going to be the last one. It was also the prettiest edition I'd ever seen, and I even regret asking my parents for the 2009 edition. However, the question arises, how does one split the Encyclopaedia Britannica? I can never buy it for my children, should I choose to have children, and it would be unfair of me to take the edition my parents bought me (and my brother). These are questions that keep me up at night.

I used to work in a newsroom, and it was almost at the cusp of the digital revolution. It was in the early 2010s, when people were just beginning to use the internet and social media for "news" and "information". Figuring out how to reconcile the newspaper with "e-news" was a discussion that lasted days, weeks, months. Now, a decade later, it's almost impossible to believe that we lived in a time where we had to wait for the newspaper to be delivered in the morning for the news, or turn on the television for "breaking" news. My journalistic sensibilities go against this kind of 24 hour news cycle, where eyeballs dictate the news. In the television show The Newsroom , Chris Messina's character says that people will move on to a channel that is current, every second we (or they) are not current. I hate that the news "biz" has come to that. It's become okay to make mistakes and correct them on the fly. Don't get me wrong, newspapers and media houses have always made mistakes and updated corrections. It's why we have public editors and ombudspersons. But, having said that, I think that in their thirst to be updated about every single world event all the time, people have forgotten to respect the subjects of news pieces. There's a detachedness to the way we look at the world, to the way we're able to switch our outpouring of sympathies from one tragedy to another in the blink of an eye.

Curated imperfection really proliferated as the internet proliferated. Influencers, especially embraced the culture of curated imperfection, setting high, unmatchable standards that every other person continues to aspire to, even today. I'm not saying that impossible standards did not exist before the internet, they did. But, having said that, there was a widely accepted social contract that these impossible standards were, in fact, impossible, and not something I could have achieved in my middling, almost boring life. With social media, however, we've seen a lot of "just like you" celebrities. Busy, working women whose lives are imperfectly perfect, real dreams you could achieve if only you worked hard enough and aspired for them. The difference here, is that these women claim to have middling, almost boring lives, just like you, when in fact they don't. I think the thing that social media has done for me, is honestly show me how absolutely average my life is, and now that I can live with it, I'm happy about it.

I'm a younger millennial. I grew up with the internet revolution and the digital revolution and all that. I really do understand how the internet works. But, I also have the dubious distinction of trying to understand how people act on the internet, and why they act the way they act. It can get anyone jaded, that. I don't really think the internet was a mistake. At least, not all the time. I do believe that we gave up a lot of things for the convenience of the internet, and I don't know that we realise the full extent of what we gave up. I think it would do us all some good to sit back, and really think about everything we've lost to the internet. Because while we have gained a lot, we've also lost a lot.

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m a fan of Paul’s NYT book review podcast, so I was excited to see she’d written a book. I enjoyed it. Paul does a good job of describing the good and the bad that has come from the massive shift the internet has brought to pretty much every part of our way of life. In Paul’s telling the changes are mostly bad, though I’m glad this book never turns into lament for “how things used to be.”

This book is very New York heavy (and sometimes very French heavy?) but I found myself relating to a lot of what she writes:

“How is it that activities that you’d never in a zillion years be roped into doing in real life - paging through an old acquaintance’s baby album, suffering through an odd slide show from Turkey - become strangely alluring online?”

And it also got me reminiscing things I probably would have never thought about again:

“That moment at the beginning of the first day of school when books were handed out - if you were lucky you got one of the shiny new ones, maybe even an updated edition, but if you were unlucky you had to write your name on the inside back cover under the name of the student who had your bio textbook last year - was a thing of the past. No getting excited or annoyed about which upperclassmen had your textbook before. No spending time trying to discern something about the previous owner by deciphering old doodles.”

[Mary · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was so sad. We have lost SO MUCH to the Internet. I miss most of the things Pamela Paul mentions. And now, here I am, writing on the Internet. I love to keep track of my books on Goodreads, but I still keep a written copy (something I have been doing since 1971). I do miss meeting people at workshops and conferences--everyone is looking down at a screen instead of at each other. I miss getting birthday cards and letters in the mail. I miss trying to remember what movie that actor was in or who wrote that book. I even miss cursive writing! I am sad that boys aren't reading much any more and that many schools no longer have libraries. I gave this book five stars, but I can't say that I really liked it. I guess future generations won't know what they missed. I feel sad for them.

[Kevidently · Rating 2 out of 5]

I guess I thought it would be funnier.

Essentially a listicle in book form, Pamela Paul's 100 Things We've Lost to the Internet felt like it should be interesting and thought-provoking, a little silly and a little profound. I LOVED her book, My Travels with Bob, about keeping track of all the books she read in a reading journal named Bob. But this? This was difficult.

Every single topic - from "Boredom" to "Working Independently" to "Social Cues" and everything in between - feels like a harangue, a dire warning that we have lost far too much by giving our souls to the internet. Zennials don't know how to type. Our ability to have closure with anything has been ripped from us. People are taking our childhood pictures and selling them on the Dark Web. There were some fun and funny parts of this book, but basically it's the same diatribe over and over again: by connecting with everyone, you connect with no one, especially yourself. Nothing is real, everything is manufactured, and everything you ever loved will be stripped away.

Certainly I agree with Paul on some of this stuff, and yes it's alarming that the internet has rendered some of our old practices obsolete so quickly. But the sort of moral panic and hectoring that crops up in so many of these entries feels a bit much for a book like this. Was it me? Was it the marketing? Was it the expectation? I thought it would be pithy and it just made me feel bad. Ironically, I found myself reading the entry about how we never read books in bed before sleep anymore in bed before sleep. I kind of regret reading this one and that's weird for me.

[Matthew · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book of short essays on things that the internet has removed from modern life is a very fun read. By turns wistful and funny, if you're old enough to remember the 1980's this is a treat.

[Laila]

This irritated me. We didn’t “lose” birthday cards, Christmas cards, bedside reading, record albums, movie theaters, etc. You can still choose to experience those things! No, we don’t have marathon phone call sessions on the one corded family phone anymore, trying to drag the phone as far away as the cord will stretch. But that’s okay. I don’t know, I guess I wanted this to be deeper and more philosophical.

[Federica Rampi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Il prima e il dopo

Con umorismo accattivante e leggerezza Pamela Paul, editorialista di opinione per il New York Times, racconta la storia di come, in poco più di 20 anni, abbiamo perso le abitudini , stravolto i nostri comportamenti lo studio, il lavoro, le nostre scelte commerciali, il tempo libero
Per chi ha meno di 40 anni probabilmente il libro rappresenterà l'evocazione di una realtà strana, noiosa e magari scomoda, per i più "grandi" (come me, che ad ogni pagina ho più volte annuito) sarà l’occasione per rivivere un senso di perdita verso quegli anni che appaiono ora così distanti.
Chi ricorda più a memoria un numero di telefono?
Chi usa ancora una cartina stradale o spedisce una cartolina?

Annoiarsi ha cambiato volto, specie nei bambini, che passano da un videogioco all’altro dimenticando quanto fosse bello far lavorare l’immaginazione per ammazzare il tempo magari durante un lungo viaggio in auto; ma anche noi adulti facciamo lo stesso: in coda o nelle sale d’attesa alla chiacchierata spontanea preferiamo guardare lo smartphone.
L’intrattenimento, com’è pensato oggi, impigrisce perché non c’è più bisogno di inventarsi un passatempo.
Dietro allo schermo c’è tutto, o quasi.
Iperconnessi, abbiamo la possibilità di essere mentalmente in più posti alla volta, di interagire e leggere tutti coloro che bussano alla nostra porta virtuale cercando la nostra attenzione tra e-mail, aggiornamenti, notizie e notifiche.
Anche la punteggiatura è stata vittima di questa piccola grande rivoluzione
“Su internet, il punto fermo nella migliore delle ipotesi è un optional. Su Twitter, nessuno conclude una frase con un punto fermo, a meno di non voler fare la figura del parvenu.”

Abbracciamo Internet perché sembra incrementare la nostra autonomia, ma in realtà il mondo online non offre scelte significative, se non abbandonare il vecchio per il nuovo .

"100 cose che abbiamo perso per colpa di Internet” non è solo una nostalgica lamentela su ciò che non c’è più, perché alcune cose che si sono perse per strada non ci mancheranno affatto, come le voluminose enciclopedie gli schedari e i cataloghi cartacei, ma rimane la consapevolezza di aver almeno vissuto un’adolescenza libera dall’eccesso di informazioni e una vita con più buone maniere e soprattutto più privacy
Si, perché se ci illudiamo che il "cloud" sia qualcosa di effimero, non abbiamo fatto i conti con quante tracce digitali lasciamo.
Nel cyberspazio la parola "fine" non esiste “Internet non perdona e non dimentica neanche la più piccola delle gaffe” e in Rete gli errori durano per sempre.

[Isabel · Rating 3 out of 5]

"But, as the novelist Neil Gaiman put it, "Google can bring you back a hundred thousand answers. A librarian can bring you back the right one".

[Stephen Kiernan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book will make you laugh, then feel nostalgic, then feel critical, then feel wistful. It is absolutely worth reading, even if you are the most obsessed techie in miles.

Years ago I read this author's book Pornified -- which, as a polemic against the spread of internet porn, was the literary equivalent of shaking a fist at the sea. But now we can see more clearly the assets and liabilities of our increasingly digital life.

This book does not read as a polemic at all. It's more like a series of newspaper columns, whose individual entries are funny and clever, but which over time says something larger about how our society and interactions have irrevocably changed. We will not miss the know-it-all, anymore than teenagers will miss trying to chat up a love interest on a kitchen phone with the whole family listening.

But I felt that something important was lost when people sitting down for dinner started bringing their phones to the table. I miss letters to the editor, signed by an actual person using their actual name. There's much more, but I don't want to spoil it.

Even if you love Facebook, even if the first thing you do in the morning is check your phone, you will find plenty to entertain you in this book.

[Deb (Readerbuzz) Nance · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pamela Paul writes an essay about each of one hundred things that she feels we have lost to the Internet. Some are obvious to all of us, like flea market finds and high school reunions. Some are less so, like being late and benign neglect. All of the essays are thoughtful and engaging.

[Jt O'Neill · Rating 4 out of 5]

I saw this reviewed somewhere and picked it up at the library. For me, it was an interesting, quick read. I like the way Pamela Paul takes a short look at 100 things that used to play a major role in our lives but now are gone or on the way out. As far as I'm, concerned, some of losses are fine. I don't care about losing the TV Guide, my checkbook, touch typing, or even figuring out who that actor is. Other losses are more painful - loss of eye contact, loss of civility. even loss of snail mail birthday cards. Granted, not all losses are lost across the board. Ms Paul highlights the loss of photo albums but you can still do that. She cites loss of school libraries but I think the essence of school libraries can easily be preserved. She suggests that phone calls are lost but, in my experience, face time calls are even more connecting and valuable than old school phone calls.

I believe that the internet has improved our lives in many ways. No doubt it has made connection easier. It has made research and knowledge more available for many. But it is useful to look at what has been lost. This book makes me wonder if human beings really know what has been lost with the arrival of the internet. Again, this is a light book but the meaning behind it is deeper to me. Ms Paul asks us to consider how the internet has affected our personal lives, our emotional selves. She throws out these 100 things but underneath that is a bigger question. Are we happy with the arrival of the internet? Are there things we want to preserve? I think it's wise to be open to change but to still have an awareness of what we both losing and gaining. This little book is a delightful beginning to that awareess.

[Lena · Rating 2 out of 5]

1.5 ⭐ TW: boomer energy 🥴

Interesting idea, disappointing execution. This lacked direction, with the author spending most of the book talking out of her ass.

Throughout the book, Paul constantly conflated the internet with technology in general - computers, phones, and even cameras at one point? If you're going to focus on changes brought on by the internet, maybe don't mention something that has existed since the advent of digital cameras. Kind of damages your book's credibility.

A lot of the other chapters seemed to be more her opinion than anything else. No one goes to stores anymore? As someone who works in retail, let me tell you - people are still going to stores. Buying gifts online automatically means you haven't put any thought into the gift? Literally no evidence given for that statement. People often buy gifts in person without putting in any thought, too, Pamela. And what about the internet supposedly killing touch typing and young people not knowing how to do it? Explain that one, please. The worst typists I've personally seen are boomers, so....so much for your touch typing lessons at school, I guess.

But my biggest gripe with this book is the lateness chapter. No one cares about lateness because they're happy to have some extra time on their phones? Are you for real? I've never been excited that someone is late, nor have I seen someone else react that way. What the actual fuck was this one. Seriously, someone teach this woman about the "point, explanation, example" paragraph structure. She desperately needs it.

[Greg Talbot · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Connection" may be the most loaded word of the post-internet age. Pamela Paul describes 100 things in our pre-wired world that explore the ways we connected with materials (magazines, Christmas cards) and experiences (making memories, starting up life in a new city) . Written in skimmable, and easily digestible chapters, this catalog provides a mixed bag of the world we lost, and the one we are in currently.

The book has a fun, unhurriedness about it, and it is agreeable in the content it provides. It hardly scratches the dark ways social media undermines mental health , political civility, and truth. That's a different kind of book, but the items Paul focuses on are largely Internet 1.0. And it's a very deliberate choice, but she explores what we missed, instead of what is gained through the integration of technologies.

There is more than surface here, and there are a lot of things to ponder of the lost world. Our remembered selves are more fragmented, our social media more determinate, and our relationships largely more distant and alienated. Still, I think this book could have provided deeper trend analysis...sharing deeper insights into the world we lost. Also, the technology that has created the change...network speeds, social media, cell phone platforms, is never explored.

A fun read. Something to click open and scroll through, when you can't find a paper magazine in sight.

[Lisa J Shultz · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this list quite interesting. I believe it will appeal most to baby boomers, and I found it thought provoking particularly in regards to online presence and interaction. Kids of baby boomers will probably find it humorous.
A few of the listings, I still have or do such as write checks and create photo albums (although substantially less). I love paper maps and will continue to use them for trips, but I do utilize my GPS when driving around the city to an unfamiliar location. And I will absolutely continue to read a paperback book in bed before I go to sleep and send a Christmas card with a letter each December.
I am okay with losing bad photos and traditional cameras and film printing procedures. Losing old tech like fax machines and extra equipment is just fine by me.
I do miss TV Guide, penmanship, memory (such as remembering people's phone numbers), productivity (too much time wasted dealing with email), and phone calls.
I enjoyed thinking about the 100 things. Now I would like to see a list of 100 things we have lost to Covid...

[High Plains Library District · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection of short essays by Pamela Paul will be of interest to readers of a certain age who remember what life was like before the Internet. Boredom, bad photos, the family meal, a good night’s sleep, TV Guide, your checkbook, figuring out who that actor is, movie theaters, card catalogs, maps, and humility—all these and more are on the list of things she maintains have been lost to, or at least radically changed by, the Internet.

While Paul, former editor of The New York Times Book Review, does include some things she’s happy we’ve lost, the vast majority in this jeremiad provoke in her expressions of regret, which range from concise social criticism to vague and fond nostalgia. Born in 1970, Paul is not as old as some of her admittedly “grumpy old man” opinions might lead you to believe, and a number of her complaints can actually be laid at the foot of technology other than the Internet. These minor quibbles, though, don't significantly detract from often thought-provoking observations.

[mahesh · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have expected this book to be thought-provoking. But it was just a general rant without detailed logic behind it. personally, I have lost many things with the advent of the internet. But this book was boring to read.

one thing I've lost to the internet.

1. I can no longer be the stupid one, There are millions brainless than me on the internet. Internet deprived me of the ability to be stupid.

Read-only 50% of the book, It's too boring to continue. Essays have good context, but no good content provokes dull-witted brain of mine.

[Sukrit · Rating 2 out of 5]

A very starrey-eyed look on the things we've lost to the Internet, bordering on fogeyism.

I agree with the author on big lifestyle changes that were probably "lost" to the Internet (e.g., boredom, creativity, being lost and finding new places, physical music collections), but some of the things we've "lost" I believe everyone was happy to get rid of! (e.g., living with the uncertainty of who an actor in a movie is, flipping through pages of encyclopedia to find information)

[Brianna Kinley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This isn’t my typical read but I’m glad I found it while scrolling through NetGalley. Most of Paul’s list was way before my time, so I got to relive those while reading through the list. Most of the things he discussed are important concepts, since we’ve slowly been losing certain aspects of life thanks to the Internet.

[Jed Walker · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have thought of many of these but when you see them all together it’s compelling. You also realize trying to explain this to younger people who have no context for how things used to be is like speaking a different language. 😂

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Amusing. I'm glad that I got to experience most of the things that are now "lost" to the internet, but I do feel the need to confess that I read this on my phone by downloading the eBook via...the internet. :)

[Matthew Jordan · Rating 3 out of 5]

In the book Technopoly, Neil Postman says that "technological change is neither additive nor subtractive. It is ecological." It is fruitless to ask whether the internet, or the steam engine, or the printing press, or the wheel were "good" or "bad" for society. But new technologies do not add or detract; they transform. Society after the steam engine is fundamentally different than before.

So instead of asking whether technologies are good or bad, we should instead ask questions like: in what way did this technology reconfigure human relations? How did it change labour conditions? How did it change the way we communicate? What was lost? What was gained? What problems did it solve, and what new problems did it engender?

100 Things We Lost to the Internet is an earnest attempt to answer these questions. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen another book like it. It feels so nonjudgemental. It takes the internet as neither hero nor villain. The internet didn’t make our lives better or worse, it simply (simply!) reconfigured society in countless ways we are still only beginning to understand. I think that this idea is more profound than any of the actual chapters in the book, which are mostly just breezy and nostalgic.

There were a few sad moments—for example, realizing that school libraries are a dying breed that are being replaced by computer labs—and a few fun revelations—for instance realizing that Siri trains us not to say please or thank you. It was also valuable to think about the absolute impossibility of travelling before the internet. You just….bought your travel tickets…at a…what, a kiosk? And coordinated with people how? Pay phones? Did people just show up places and wait for people? And navigated how? Using physical maps? It’s kind of inconceivable to think about now.

Another realization for me was that a lot of the changes that are supposedly due to the internet are actually due to the iPhone and social media. I think we sometimes overrate the importance of the internet and underrate the iPhone. Putting a phone and alarm clock and camera and calculator in our pockets enabled something that, to me, feels radically different than having access to the same tools on a desktop computer. Being able to photograph and document the world around us so easily I think has led to a fairly profound collective change in the way we view life—as something to be captured and re-lived, as something to be entered into the historical record, as an ongoing film in which we are the main or supporting characters. To me, this is not quite a feature of “the internet”, though of course the internet played a major role in making it possible.

In sum: fun book! Worthwhile to get you to meditate on the theme of the transformations wrought by the internet, but somewhat forgettable in its specific details.

[Paige · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was written immediately before, during, and after 2020, so I think our society has already started to correct some of the errors Paul points out, but this is still a nostalgic and eye-opening exposé of just how pervasive an effect the Internet (particularly Web 2.0, with social media and similar interactive platforms) has had on first-world culture. That all sounds like it requires a heavy philosophical treatise, but this book really is 100 interesting little chapters each focused on something analog that was once a given part of everyday life.

The following may seem like a random and sexist takeaway, but the tidbit I found most telling was that the Internet was largely designed by young men; as such, it prioritizes money, power, and instant gratification and shapes the behavior of its users accordingly. Had the developers been more demographically balanced, Paul implies, they might have tempered these tendencies with other qualities that, while part of the human psyche, are less visible online. This is probably a slight overgeneralization as of course many young men are not like this, but it did help explain some of the stark differences between virtual and real-world life.

Also, I think the author would be proud that I discovered this book the old-fashioned way, by spotting it on the library holdshelf waiting for someone else. :)

[Sarah Kay · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this more than I expected! Even though it’s basically a book that swims through nostalgia for a time when tech was slower and less intrusive, it also was a clever way to illustrate how our current toxic relationship with tech is fairly recent. The stories of tech-free life was so inspiring, that I took myself to dinner and didn’t look at my phone for the entire meal, instead just sitting and observing. Maybe I’m just growing up and turning the person who says “well, back in my day…” but I’d recommend this as an easy read, or a god gift book.

[Audrey Hart Phillips · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book makes you want to burn your laptop, smash your phone, and scream into the void of the internet. It’s a weirdly upsetting book. It had me wishing I was back talking to my friends on the kitchen phone yelling at my siblings that it was in fact my turn to use it. It had me wishing vacations felt like vacations with no emails or phones. This book really pulled at my heart strings.

[Iva · Rating 3 out of 5]

Maybe it is my choice to actually still use some of the things Pamela Paul says are lost. I still use Scrabble tiles, my trusty Rolodex and many others. Her observations are interesting to debate, but I think it was hard to come up with 100. I particularly liked parent's undivided attention and didn't agree with encylopedia. And of course I miss the card catalog!

[Tara · Rating 5 out of 5]

A book that makes sense! We have lost so much to the web. I would be fine with going back to the 80s.

[Sherri Silvera · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

Nothing really new here but a lovely walk down memory lane.