A few of Stoll's predictions have some validity. Consider the final paragraph:
What's missing from this electronic wonderland? Human contact. Discount the fawning techno-burble about virtual communities. Computers and networks isolate us from one another. A network chat line is a limp substitute for meeting friends over coffee. No interactive multimedia display comes close to the excitement of a live concert. And who'd prefer cybersex to the real thing? While the Internet beckons brightly, seductively flashing an icon of knowledge-as-power, this nonplace lures us to surrender our time on earth. A poor substitute it is, this virtual reality where frustration is legion and where—in the holy names of Education and Progress—important aspects of human interactions are relentlessly devalued.
Certainly, the internet has made it increasingly possible for people to never leave their homes to shop, work, or even socialize.
At the same time, however, Stoll underrates consumers' sense of their own needs and desires. The internet can and will never devalue human interactions: only people can do that. It is arguably because people value "human interactions" so much that the internet has become such a big deal. Media like Facebook and Twitter have made it easier to arrange meetings and facilitate human contact. They have enabled old friends to keep in touch. One would be hard pressed to find someone who thinks that people were more connected to one another fifteen years ago than they are now. The internet provides an obvious example of the improvements to our standard of living spurred by economic growth and enterprising technological innovation.
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