The old man told his children and his grandchildren of the World Wide Web. “It was beautiful. All of human knowledge at your fingertips..."

“But weren’t there bad things on there, Grandpa?”

“Bad things? Ha! The bad things were the cornerstones of the internet. We were free, free to communicate, to talk, people used to talk, you know? I had friends all over the world! We could talk, we could sing, we could collaborate!” The old man sighed. “But then it all came to an end. Boys and old men, greedy, merciless men, who only saw the next dollar sign, came. They put an end to our great internet. They consolidated and reformed, claiming it was protecting the children.” He gestured with his cane at the eldest, “Even as children younger than you were gunned down in the streets. They whined about those ‘bad things’ corrupting your minds even as children were tortured and murdered.” I had friends all over the world! We could talk, we could sing, we could collaborate!” The old man sighed. “But then it all came to an end. Boys and old men, greedy, merciless men, who only saw the next dollar sign, came. They put an end to our great internet. They consolidated and reformed, claiming it was protecting the children.” He gestured with his cane at the eldest, “Even as children younger than you were gunned down in the streets. They whined about those ‘bad things’ corrupting your minds even as children were tortured and murdered.”

He sighed, “They consolidated and crushed, put it all into a trash compactor.”

“Then what?” The youngest demanded, rapt with attention.

“They deleted it.”

“What?” The children gasped.

“The entire world wide web. It cost money to keep it afloat, understand? Everything relied on it, our knowledge, our interactions across the globe, many of our electronics…and they waved a hand and it all went away.”

“But…but why?”

The old man glared, “To make a profit, boy! Why else? They destroyed the World Wide Web because they finally found a way to profit from it! They realized it cost money to keep it afloat, and off it went. The entire internet, our books, movies, games, artwork– things that had been digitized and never stored anywhere else– everything we built over three decades, lost forever in the dark.” He sighed, “Like Alexandria…all of it. Gone forever.”“To make a profit, boy! Why else? They destroyed the World Wide Web because they finally found a way to profit from it! They realized it cost money to keep it afloat, and off it went. The entire internet, our books, movies, games, artwork– things that had been digitized and never stored anywhere else– everything we built over three decades, lost forever in the dark.” He sighed, “Like Alexandria…all of it. Gone forever.”

The children were silent. “But…can’t we bring it back?”

At that moment, the cops burst in to arrest the old man. The children were hauled away to the labor camps, as the statement was read to the man. “You are under arrest for corrupting the youth.”

The old man laughed, knowing the young officer had never heard of Socrates.