Your definition of the internet as just modern social media is, in my opinion, deeply reductive. There is so much beautiful, useful and enlightening stuff out there on the internet, much more than any one person could ever hope to even delve, let alone hold within their mind. And yes, corporate interests have been behind social media from the first "like". Does that mean that maybe people should go out and touch grass? Yes, of course it does. Does that mean that all social media is inherently evil? I mean, maybe? I'm willing to be convinced that even somewhere federated might be irredeemably corrupted by purpose and intent as a tool, much like the rifle and bomb up above. (I actually agree with your earliest point about how the block feature on Lemmy was likely implemented in that way to allow for minority opinions to have the last word, often to the benefit of Tankies.) But the entire technology of the internet as nothing more than the opiate of the masses? No. Just because you seem to be disillusioned by it doesn't mean that all effort to use digital connections is futile, let alone that that is somehow causing all of the world's problems. The problems we're seeing today are just the consequences of the political and regulatory decisions of the last 100 years, from Ratfucking to the failure of Antitrust, from climate change to corporate capture. Certainly sped up by the vast acceleration in information transfer rates from the 90s to now, but none of them caused by it. Even the existence of Billionaires is a symptom, not the cause. The root cause is debatable, but I would posit that it is the laissez-faire capitalist perspective of most governments in the world with respect to corporate regulation in all respects.