[WattsUpWithThat] Obama and Angela Merkel Blame Internet and Social Media for Disrupting GlobalismPresident Barack Obama and German Chancellor Angela Merkel are blaming the internet for disrupting the forces of globalism, suggesting that technology is making it more difficult to unite people behind a common purpose.
"Because of the internet and communications, the clash of cultures is much more direct," Obama said during a press conference on his trip to Berlin. "People feel, I think, less certain about their identity. Less certain about economic security."
Obama predicted that the rise of technology needed to be managed to give world citizens more control, beyond the simplistic answers found online.
His German counterpart agreed.
"Digitization is a disruptive force, a disruptive technological force that brings about deep-seated change, transformation of a society," Merkel added.
She compared the internet to the invention of the printing press, citing the consequences it had on industrialized countries.
"It took a while until societies learned how to find the right kind of policies to contain this and to manage and steer this," she said.
I guess this may have come a little too late for some tastes?