Would you be able to live without internet access?

i would die lol i love the internet and for more than just research hehe;)

It’s become depended upon by both consumers and business. It’s hard to imagine not having it now. But, yes, I could certainly survive without internet access.

I can remember a time I did not have internet access. I spent a lot more money on books, newspapers, and magazines. I spent a lot more time at libraries. I hand wrote letters to friends.

I love to read. I love having access to a lot of reading material at my fingertips. If I lost internet though, I imagine I’d return to my old ways.

As part of the internet generation, I don’t think I would be able to give up the internet very easily. I use it for so many different things; the internet has a myriad of uses: I use it for research and delving into topics of interest, I use it to communicate with people (use it to communicate with my boyfriend when we are away at separate colleges), I use it to discuss issues, read the news, download music, look at photos, even watch TV. There are so many uses; that would be giving up connectivity and many resources.

Can’t say exactly how I would feel unless I tried it, but I don’t imagine the weaning process would be very smooth.

I could live without it, but I wouldn’t want to.

I would surely die. j/k

I lived the first 35 years of my life without it, I could survive. I waste quite a bit of my time staring at this screen, probably too much.

@stranger_in_a_strange_land Are we twins?

I lived the first 38 years of my life without it, tend to just turn it off randomly since, and, if it vanished, I would say “ah darn,” miss it a bit for convenience, and go on.

I would have to resume regular library and spend more on books. I would be pressed into getting * cringe * reading glasses because I am developing old age eyes. Online books are easier to read.. I do enjoy the smell and feel of a paper book, though, so I do undergo some headaches to read other than online. Also, not all that I read is available online.

I would also miss it because I keep up with international news. That would be difficult without the internet as would international correspondence.

I fractured my wrists in my teens (auto wreck… I braced against the dashboard). My friends would be subjected to the resulting painful chickenscratch that passes as my handwriting since I would have to resume snail mail.

I’ve done it before, I’m sure I could do it again. Although I’d probably start running a BBS again.

i’ve grown up with the internet, and use it everyday without fail. honestly…how did life happen without it?!?!

Life was so much less complicated before the internet! I have a whole drawer of unused book markers.

I’ve only had internet access for about two years. I’ll admit that I was much happier with my life when we didn’t have it. I’ve met some wonderful people using the internet, but I could easily get by without it.

Yes i would. :) I’d miss sites like these where i get to spend some of my free time interacting with others, but i’d get on with more useful things, so it would definitely be a blessing in disguise. It would be a schlep though to not have internet banking and i’d be wasting much more paper in having to send faxes instead of emails, or otherwise phoning instead of emailing (which i often DON’T want to do – email are so much easier, haha). Other than the obvious convenience of having all this info at your fingertips, the business side of it would become more of a hassle for me. But i’d survive for sure.

Sure. Not to say I wouldn’t miss it terribly, but I remember life before it, so I think I’d be able to cope.

I’d have to magically get the mailing addresses or telephone numbers of a few friends that I presently know no other way of contacting, other than that I wouldn’t really miss this electronic time-waster very much.

I could, but it would be a bleak, meaningless existence. :P

Of course anyone could live without the internet. Humanity has lived for hundreds of thousands of years without it and only about fifteen years with it.

The internet is a tool. A new tool. It provides faster access to most anything. It allows wider distribution of just about everything. We had tools to do almost everything the internet does before. They were just slower and clunkier.

Since it is such a useful tool, I spend most of my working day on it, as well as a good portion of my home day. It is the ultimate information access tool (so far). My life is about information—acquiring it and distributing it. I’m an information middle man, I guess. I should learn how to make money off that.

For me, the internet is primarily a communication tool. Next, it is an information gathering tool. It is also a purchasing facilitator. It is an entertainment provider, as well. If I could use it as an exercise tool and a food source, I wouldn’t ever leave it except to sleep.

Yes. But would I want to…?

The world wold be a better place without it.

@ChazMaz I dunno… We’d need to learn how to be patient again.

And mind our own business.

Well, fine. I will.
harumph.

I meant in general. lol

Oh god no! I have a very keen interest in all things tech. I am also love twitter.

If I had a nickle for every time someone asks this. Yes, I’d be able to because I’d have to.

@Simone_De_Beauvoir – You are such a realist.

And I like it!

@ChazMaz what is this?! but they call me an idealist and a pessimist and whatever other term serves them

don’t listen to them

@ChazMaz I know, my love, don’t you worry.

I’d miss it for a little while. Life was actually more interesting without it. I think it has made us dull and lazy. I’d crab about having to walk into the next room for a dictionary or get up and go to the library or go shopping in a real store, but pretty soon I’d resume all those thing I used to do.

And local merchants would thrive again, and people would remember how to have actual conversations, and we’d go out and do things more often—like interact with tangible objects and see the world in three dimensions instead of two. Wouldn’t be so bad.
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[Edit] @Arisztid and others, the question doesn’t say “without computers”—just “without the Internet.” We had computers around for quite some time before we had Internet access, remember?—glorified typewriters and adding machines, business computational devices that tracked inventory and printed invoices, analytic devices used by research institutions? You could still turn out beautiful, legible letters In your word processing software, upload data from various media and look at it online, create graphics, etc. You just wouldn’ be able to send and receive data instantaneously across communications lines.

Three years ago a flash of lightning killed our router, DSL modem, DSL splitter and the ISDN telephone system box. It took three days to have everything replaced, installed and up and running.

I was under the impression our two kids wouldn’t have missed the water flowing through our faucets as much as they missed the Internet for three whole days. I never saw my son working through an installation manual on his own that fast. I told him I had other stuff to do and if he wanted me to do it he had to wait. He didn’t want to wait. I was really impressed. All this eagerness.