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Recently, I had to solve an engineering problem: make Telegram work reliably for my wife (and for me, while I was at it). Solve it I did, of course. But I can’t tell about it in details here, understandably¹. And (quite) some time ago I also solved a somewhat similar problem: make YouTube work properly on the living-room TV. And I can’t tell about it, either.

Come to think about it, this is a basic instinct: you do something of use, you tell, explain, share so that others can do the same. This is what the whole science is about, this is what human civilization is about! That’s why we invented languages, that’s precisely the reason we invented writing. The Internet, we have it for the same purpose: to spread knowledge and share information. A wonderful property of information: “You and I each have an apple and we exchange them, each of us will have one apple, but if you and I each have an idea and we exchange them, each of us ends up with two ideas!” We, the humans, have learned how to use it effectively, and thanks to that we’ve become the dominant species on the planet (and in our star system, perhaps).

Another purpose of the Internet: finding like-minded people. People are all very different; it’s easy to imagine that you’re alone and no one will ever understand you because no one else cares about the things that concern you. But if the sample is the whole of humanity then it turns out you are certainly not alone: people are numerous, and there are those with whom you can productively discuss the very topic that you supposedly have no one to talk to about. Human is a social being, human needs companions.

This very Internet thing the governments around the world are trying their best to regulate, restrict, and spoil in every possible way. In some places they do it for the sake of big businesses, in other places for the sake of weirdly understood human rights, in yet other places for political ambitions, and in some places they are openly afraid that people would communicate and unite (people who are appaled by not being allowed to communicate). Essentially, what these governments are trying to take away from people is exactly what makes people human: the very exchange of information that makes humanity — humanity.

Such a government is the enemy of human.

I find relief, of course, in the fact that, where I live, we have extensive experience and rich traditions of spreading information and exchanging thoughts despite the strictest prohibitions. Our neighbors here on the planet also have enough ingenuity, and we can also exchange ideas… In short, humanity will be fine; human has overcome all enemies on this planet, and will cope with these too. What are the options, anyway?..