The Internet: Lifeblood of Our Generation
As I sat at home writing the latest blog (teleworking mind you, thanks to my company’s VoIP capabilities), I snapped out of my information-overloaded, technologically-entranced haze. I looked around at my apartment to survey all of the gadgets that help me throughout my day: the alarm clock, my phone, numerous light switches, the shower radio, the coffee pot, the toaster, my computer, my phone, my iPad, the microwave, the fridge, my phone, my Kindle, the thermostat, and the list is nearly endless. Did I mention my phone?
Then a thought occurred to me. What if we ran out of the energy necessary to power the turbine engines used to generate electricity…today? OK, this particular catastrophe is highly implausible (and would require the simultaneous destruction of all backup generators large and small), but I was captivated by the thought nonetheless. So what if it happened? What would I do? Or more accurately, what would I NOT be able to do? Well, everything.
My alarm wouldn’t go off. My cell phone would be useless, because there’d be no cell service. I’d have to fumble around in my dark apartment, un-showered and drowsy (I need my caffeine to function). The food in the fridge might have spoiled, so I’d resort to something in a can…and hopefully I’d have a battery-powered hotplate lying around. Teleworking would be out of the question (no Internet), and driving to work would turn into a game of Russian roulette (no stoplights, no GPS, no gas stations). I imagine I’d decide to stay in my (now candle lit) apartment. In fact, I surmise most people would. And, as a result, the world as we know it would cease to exist.
I quickly snapped out of my Walter Mitty fantasy. That scenario is merely a post-apocalyptic musing, and because I am a product of a (characteristically human) lack of foresight, I will assume my technological world will not end any time soon. But wait a second. My mind wandered into a milder catastrophic scenario.
What if just the Internet stopped working?
To truly examine that notion, I first had to understand how pervasive Internet use has become, and to what extent the Internet fuels industry itself and—tangentially—everyday life.
According to a February 2012 survey from the Pew Internet and American Life Project, 80 percent of Americans currently use the Internet for a variety of reasons (compared with 1995, when only 14 percent of Americans patiently waited through the stinging screech of a dial-up modem). Ninety-one percent of Internet dabblers use search engines like Google and Yahoo! An equal percentage uses the Internet to check email, and about 80 percent of Americans dabble around online for a particular hobby or interest. Or they check the weather.
Of course, Pew’s list of American Internet activity is very inclusive: news, YouTube, social networking, online banking, Craigslist, blogging, eBay, genealogy info, dating sites, VoIP (25 percent!), and more. But the Internet holds an even more dominant place in our lives. Consider this: Almost half of all Americans own a smartphone, and these devices now outnumber less ambitious cellphone models.
So, as my newest imaginary techno-apocalypse requires, the Internet has encountered a hiccup on a global scale. What happens next? How would my daily routine change?
It turns out, I would be in pretty much the same situation as before. Not only would my life-easing techno devices shut down, any company that uses the Internet for everyday business operations would grind to a halt as well. So no food would be delivered to the grocery store. No water would gush through the pipes to my apartment complex (or any apartment complex for that matter). Perhaps the power grid would shut down, and I’d be stuck in my first catastrophic nightmare.
Interestingly, I researched what it might take to achieve a techno apocalypse, and it is, in fact, a painful possibility (not just my Walter Mitty daydream). Deemed EMP warfare (electromagnetic pulse), a nuclear bomb could be detonated in the atmosphere above the target country. The bomb would produce a surge of electromagnetic particles, or radiation, that would effectively destroy electrical systems within its blast radius.
In written testimony delivered to Congress in 2005, the United States EMP Commission, or the Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States for Electromagnetic Pulse Attack, found that EMP warfare poses a notable threat to national security.
According to the Commission’s 2008 report, “EMP is one of a small number of threats that can hold our society at risk of catastrophic consequences … Our vulnerability is increasing daily as our use of and dependence on electronics continues to grow. The impact of EMP is asymmetric in relation to potential protagonists who are not as dependent on modern electronics.”
My desire in writing this post is not to sufficiently scare your pants off. Instead, I challenge you to realize just how dependent upon electronics—specifically the Internet—we have become. And what is even more interesting (in my opinion) is the notion that people are so terrified of using explicitly Internet-based technologies (yes, like VoIP), when in actuality, our lives are shaped by the Internet in almost every conceivable way.
So as I sit back on my couch, tap-tap-tapping away at my computer keys, I smile at my new perspective. Internet is not only the lifeblood of this generation. It hasn’t just opened up infinite knowledge to its users; it’s made the world a smaller place (cliché, I know, I know). But it has also amassed into an amorphous, all-powerful entity of sorts that I depend upon to live. OMG, right?
