Weekend Open Forum: What if the Internet didn't exist?

Have you ever wondered what would life be like if the Internet didn't exist? The Internet as we know it had its early development in the 1960s as a point-to-point communication between mainframe computers. Then the TCP/IP protocol was standarized in the 80s, and by 1995 it was revolutionizing communication worldwide.

This tidbit of information from Wikipedia really caught my attention: "It is estimated that in 1993 the Internet carried only 1% of the information flowing through two-way telecommunication, by 2000 this figure had grown to 51%, and by 2007 more than 97% of all telecommunicated information was carried over the Internet."

Sure, people had already lived long and well without the Internet, just watch an episode of Mad Men and you'll get the drill, but for us, tech and computer enthusiasts that almost feels like going back to the stone age.

I remember with particular fondness the early days of connecting to the net using a dial-up modem and waiting an hour or two for the latest version of Netscape to finally download. Waking up in the early morning (4-5am) to download the latest game demos before my ISP's lines got too congested. Add to that your fair share of positive experiences using Amazon, Google, your instant messenger of choice, and most recently social networking sites and the on-the-go capabilities of today's smartphones.

But aside from all that, remove the Internet and I'd be left without TechSpot, my true and only full-time job in the past decade. Heck, without the Internet I may have become an architect or a doctor instead.

What would you do if the Internet never existed, or why not, if the Internet somehow ceased to exist? Discuss.