Tolentino begins this essay about the personal, social, and cultural effects of the internet with a description of her experience of the internet as a child. Tolentino describes her own memories of the excitement of spending time on the internet in the early days and segues into a larger discussion of the cultural role of the internet at the time. Then, the internet seemed like a benign entity. It was centered around forms and newsgroups and didn't yet have search engines.

This internet is known as Web 1.0. Darcy DiNucci, a blogger, coined the term Web 2.0 in 1999. When this development occurred, Tolentino writes, our personal lives became public and economic incentives to boost this began to be put in place. As Tolentino traces her own life through the development of the internet, she discusses how the "curdling of the social internet" (7) began around 2012. At this time, social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter made her start to feel a compulsion to be online, as well as a simultaneous alienation linked to the performativity within the medium. It began to feel to her that the main purpose of the internet was to make oneself look good through virtue signaling—not just from liberals, but from conservatives as well.