*Note: This is kinda pointless to 99% of you out there, and may very well be boring, but I figured I'd post something relatively intelligent for a change*
I never used to believe that history repeated itself, but over time I'm starting to, and it's all thanks to the years I've spent using the internet.
Before I explain why (which is a short story in itself), a little background history. I first started using the internet more or less when it became publicly available and easily accessible. Back before there was flash, and mpeg videos, or even mp3's. Before streaming chats, or instant messaging clients, or even website names and you had to find a site by its IP address or even during it's phone number. So it's safe to say, I've seen a lot of different things happen on the web.
So, as to not bore you with more examples, onto the meat of the story. When I was in my teens, I used to spend a LOT of time on Yahoo chat. I'm not sure if any of you are familiar with it, but it was a standard text based chat that had a twist, voice communication. Because of this, you were no longer just a string of text. You now have a voice, a personality. You were now able to develop even more personal relationships with people. It was easier to tell jokes, it was easier to express emotion, and it was easier to tell someone off.
Due to the stronger bonds that people gradually developed, they started to form cliques. These cliques eventually started to become more organized and became crews or gangs. They had names (such as Alliance of Domination) and many of them had ranks for their members (generally based on a military system). As time passed, the crews grew in size, as did the numbers of crews themselves. After a while, the crews started getting into cyber fights with each other, many of them lasting for weeks. Often, people would defect from one crew and go to another, or even pretend to do so as to more or less spy on the group. After about a year of this, the crews gradually fell apart, people learned to not put so much trust into someone on the internet, and it pretty much became a regular everyday chat again where most of the people are just acquaintances, and not trying to be best friends or anything.
Well, strangely enough it's happening again 15 years later. Except now it is on the mobile chat apps. It seems to be the most prevalent on one I use called CB Radio chat (No, it is not an actual CB). So far it has been going through the same thing, but it seems to be at a more rapid pace. And strangely enough, it's a lot more personal. Many people on there call each other, text each other, send messages on apps like Kakao, and when one of them leaves a crew for another, or gets kicked out of one, to no surprise they get harassed by phone. But outside of that last part, it seems to be a carbon copy of the old Yahoo days, and that's one of the many reasons why I'm fairly convinced that history does in fact repeat itself.
