To feel like I wouldn’t be that bothered if the internet disappeared?

I am not sucked in to that kind of crap so… I certainly would miss the internet

How does it solve the AI issue? That'll carry on regardless! Have you not seen AI devices? AI weapons?

I mean, the economy would cease to function so it’s unlikely to result in your greater happiness, but I kind of know what you mean.

Well AI needs the internet to function so no internet, no AI.

but as I said, literally everything now needs the internet to function so unless the OP wants to be a subsistence farmer, there’s no rowing back.

Yabu, how would you use mumsnet to tell us this? 😩😩

I’m with you OP. If they reckon we’ve got three to ten years till our robot overlords rise up and finish us off, there’s time to take things back offline. A lot of things will become more arduous, but on the flip side there would be jobs again, and people would learn how to talk to each other again without having a panic attack if they have to talk out loud. Or maybe conversations would consist of writing on a big pad with a pen and holding it up.

How would book anything, bank or find out what is wrong with you medically. The world is dependant on the Internet

Queue up outside HMV or on the phone, walk to the bank (when they reopen the local branches) and visit the GP, like we used to do.

It is now but people did bank, book things, and get medical advice and information before the internet existed.

Ok so I guess if this is a thought experiment what the OP is really saying is if everything magically went back to pre internet rather than the internet just disappeared, taking civilisation with it.

I still think we’d all vote to get it back within a year.

GenX here I remember life without internet…would happily revert.

Stand alone AI exists. Weapons can’t rely on the internet.

Working from home would be history for most though. So, more commuting, traffic, crowded trains etc.

AI in the broadest sense doesn’t need the internet to function.

Well I’d have to go back to the office for a start, which I would not be happy about!

I guess otherwise I could manage. It wouldn’t be ideal but I’m nearly 60 so had plenty of years without the internet. Life is just so much easier with it though. It has its downsides of course but I wouldn’t want to lose the positives.

I would happily live without the Internet and those damn mobile phones - worst invention ever! Why does anyone want to be available 24/7/365? It beats me.

Most small towns don’t have banks anymore, lots of high street shops have closed down, almost all government departments now run online, car tax etc.
our society runs on the internet, even school lunch money.
care workers notes are taken and kept on apps, the list is endless.

I guess not but training and developing it would surely become exponentially more difficult.

I think that people have short memories if they can't remember what it was like before knowledge was so freely available. I would never choose to go back, my life would be immeasurably reduced.

I'd be worse at my job, worse at my hobbies, worse at managing my house and worse at supporting my nd dc. I'd be able to do much less DIY, have a tiny repertoire of recipes, wouldn't be able to find groups based around my interests.

Without the internet, we allow specific institutions to regulate what information the public gets access to, and I don't think that's a good thing.

Same! Overall I think we were better off without it.

The adjustment on daily living process would be MAMMOTH. Pensions, benefits, medical care, food supply and logistics, banking, land transport, airports and flights, professional education, safeguarding, refuse collection… the list goes on.

I doubt many younger people will know how we did it in the sixties and seventies but it involved lots and lots of clerks, typists and messengers.

Yes, we should ban anything that in anyway signifies any sort of technological progress, because progress is inherently bad. Let's get rid of Television, Electricity, the Combustion Engine, Mains Gas, indoor plumbing, the printing press etc etc...

Trudging to a bank at lunch time because it's the only time working people can get there, endlessly trailing around the town centre in the pissing rain trying dozens of shops because none of them stock the actual item you need, waiting weeks and/or months for the local library to get a book delivered so you can do the barest minimum of research on a simple topic... Yes, what a joy life was pre-internet.

We've had people buying stuff from mail order catalogues for decades.
People used to buy cheap items from market stalls.
Consumerism won't go away if the internet did.

The only thing I'd miss is online supermarket shopping/delivery. I detest going to the supermarket, and find it much easier to stick to a budget doing my food shop online. I would happily do without SM, amazon, video streaming, online banking etc.

Banks have gone,
lots of people don’t have a land line, and if they do there is no one on the other end, most things things if you ring it’s just an automated voice telling you to go online,
it would cost money the country does not have and how would you recruit without the internet.
the world was different then, it doesn’t just come back if the internet goes offline.