>Yes, I'm quite certain there would have been plenty of people who would have seen the value of cellphones and the internet at the time.
And there would have been social media junkies and helicopter parents using it to make their lives worse, too. I doubt it would have been used significantly differently back then.
>But even if one dismisses the value of access to media to quality of life, the degree to which online services (any service, including streaming media) democratize that access compared to the limitations of physical media and gatekept broadcasts
I wasn't alive for the introduction of VHS, but was for the shift from tape to DVD to torrents to Netflix. The amount of media consumed increased dramatically one physical media died, and even that small amount of exercise and social interaction walking around blockbuster and thanking the guy behind the counter has been squeezed out in the name of efficient distribution.
>That seems like an objective improvement to quality of life in the same way that the printing press, internal combustion engine and indoor toilets were.
And yet I literally threw mine away and don't miss it. It was nothing but a distraction that prevented me from doing things I needed to do.
>my niece and nephew have a huge backyard they play in, and my nephew also makes games for his friends on Roblox
That sounds like my wife's upbringing in South Africa. Hardly an ideal to emulate.
>white Christian conservative male
Black families have been disintegrating even faster.