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1. Terret+(OP)[view] [source] 2022-09-08 23:58:32
Folks had mobile phones in the 90s. Most folks I worked with had them.

Remember that mobile phones were already "StarTac" sized in 1996:

https://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2009/05/the-evolution-of-ce...

As for social media, "Eternal September" was in 1993. In fact, I noted my grandmother's perception that people putting their thoughts out there was disruptive. In her mind that, like radio or TV that she saw get invented, this was obviously going to suddenly be everyone. So you're saying she was right. But she'd already seen it in the last millennium.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September

As for "fall of American Democracy", actually, the 1960s and early 1970s didn't feel a whole lot different from the recent summer of discontent, and remember that the LA Riots were 1992. And for someone around since 1900, 'fall of American democracy' was, at several points, not "unthinkable".

In any case, "social media" hundreds of years ago was called "pamphleteering" and, for example, contributed to French Revolution:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pamphleteer

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