‘If video killed the radio star, what did the internet kill?’ – 23 things we have loved and lost in the digital age

The internet has brought us some good things, like having your weekly shop delivered to your door at a few clicks of a mouse. And bad things, like tech billionaires having a frightening amount of influence over elections. And it’s also caused us to lose a few things. Over on AskReddit, user laughing_rabbit_9 posed this question, inspired by this fabulous song by The Buggles:

‘If video killed the radio star. What did the internet kill?’

And people chipped in with the things we no longer have in the digital age. So many things …

1.

‘Video killed the radio star. Internet killed the video store.’
–fine_sharts_degree

2.

‘Magazines.’
–WrickDinkles

3.

‘My attention span.’
–Spiritual_Parfait_94

4.

‘No more Encyclopedia Britannica taking up 2-3 rows of the bookshelf.’
–JFunkX

5.

‘Blockbuster, and I’m still upset that it took my Friday night movie decisions away from a hands-on experience! The only reading I ever did was the back of DVDs.’
–madmiral_akbar

6.

‘The internet killed arguing with a friend over a minor disagreement about an objective topic because you can just look up who’s right.’
–Real-Pomegranate-235

7.

‘It killed the segregation of village idiots from each other. Now they all congregate and get a platform to mumble about flat earth, chupacabras, red shoe clubs. Now we got Q anon and Andrew Tate selling pyramid schemes.’
–UnitLost89

8.

‘Travel agents.’
–surfdad67

9.

‘The music industry. I was in a band that toured the country doing shows, selling CDs and t-shirts. We never made money but we made enough to get to the next gig and we eventually got a small deal with a major record label. There’s no way you could do such a thing these days without having deep investment upfront and even then…’
–BrettTheShitmanShart

10.

‘Accountability. Nameless, faceless trolls everywhere.’
–Polz34

11.

‘Handwritten letters and cards.’
–stateofyou