M1.2.2

The internet did, in fact, begin as a tool of the "maaaaan" as ARPANET a military communication tool which became the publicly used internet protocol we use today. Although its origins are militaristic, once the internet was in the hands of the public many communities, groups and cultures beyond those relating to the military were quickly formed. This internet was much different than the internet most people interact with today. Many of these beginnings did occur in the silicon valley region of California, which was only natural due to its establishment as a headquarters of computers oriented subculture.

It is worth considering how we've come to the middle of the road state of the internet. The convergence topic helps explain this. The top-down and bottom-up really kind of grew together in the shaping of the internet and any user today does have the option to take either road. But, I will state my bias here in saying that a majority of users, especially new ones tend to get stuck in the top-down road of the internet controlled by the mass media and never go beyond their Facebook homepage, for example.

As an aside, it has been reported that a growing minority of users believe Facebook, simply, is the internet. 

Now, it really does depend on the person when asking how one will use the interest. After all, the hippie counter-culture of regional silicon valley was a close relative if not the mother of early online culture. And so, it was the venture capitalists soon after that saw the internet as a new tool for brand new businesses and the expansion of existing businesses, as opposed to the kind of frontier of digital social space as it was being used by its earlier and initial hippie counter-culture users.

Fast forward to today and think about Twitter, Facebook, etc, and its hard to deny that today's internet as consumed by the majority is an amalgamation of both of the mass communications corporations from the top-down and the participatory users from the bottom up.