10 Things the Internet Has Killed or Ruined (and 5 Things It Hasn't)

A few weeks ago, the Jeff Ward show on 590AM had a discussion about an article put out by PC World called: "10 Things the Internet Has Killed or Ruined (and 5 Things It Hasn't)". He kept his listeners hanging, only revealing one thing from the list every 20 minutes or so while he opened the floor for discussion. He asked his audience: 1) can you guess what's on this list? and/or 2) what would you put on this list?

So, I pose the same questions to you... What would your top 10 list/5 list include? Here is what I would say:

ANNA's 10 things the internet has killed or ruined? (I made my lists before reading PC World's)

1. snail mail (you know with stamps and a postman) and the art of writing letters.
2. the technical quality of songs (because the computer speakers and the downloadable sizes-- totally an answer influenced by being married to a musician).
3. albums (along the same lines as above, but now you can just buy 1 song and not an entire artist's album-- kinda ruins the art of it all).
4. innocence of children (because such young kids can easily access stuff like porn or ganster rap, etc-- as witnessed by my own 5th grade nephew).
5. attention spans.
6. morality (can you say: overabundance of porn?).
7. patience (we can get instant info online at any time).
8. privacy (I realize the argument could be made that you don't have to put all your info out there-- and you don't-- but there is still an abundance of info that YOU don't put out there that gets out there-- think tax assessments, think family trees, think photos your friends put of you online that you'd never have posted yourself, think registrations/affiliations...).
9. trust in your research resources (you can find info that supports almost any claim and there is seemingly no way to tell if its bogus or legit).
10. productivity at work (think about the amount of time you waste, at work, checking emails, shopping online, Facebooking, etc).
    

ANNA's 5 things (the internet) hasn't killed or ruined?

1. "The Man" (who now simply tracks with more accuracy and depth your likes/dislikes based on what you surf online and through searching key words you type online or in emails).
2. garage sales (I thought this would have gone-- but nope, we've just added extra mini-garage sales through craigslist/ebay).
3. shopping (especially in niche products, which apart from the internet would have been more hard to come by).
4. competitive pricing (now that you can cross-reference, say, flights from every airline all on one site, you truly can get great deals).
5. celebrity (in fact the internet has broadened the definition of who could be "famous"-- think followers, # of site hits, # of downloads, youtube, etc)
   

To read PC World's opinion of the Top 10/Top 5 List, CLICK HERE. But try to make your own list first and see how well you do. :)

And I'd love to hear your lists-- post em in my comments. Or comment on my lists...