Introduction -- Boredom -- The period -- The know-it-all -- Getting lost -- Losing your ticket -- The meet-cute -- Bad photos -- Filing -- Ex-boyfriends -- Being late -- Benign neglect -- The designated driver -- The phone call -- Medical forms -- Uninhibitedness -- The school library -- Flea market finds -- High school reunions -- "They forgot my birthday" -- The phone in the kitchen -- The family meal -- Private humiliation -- The bookish boy -- Window shopping -- Solitude -- Productivity -- Letters to the editor -- Losing yourself in a show -- The Rolodex -- Relying on the doctor -- Being first -- Being the only one -- Birthday cards -- A good night's sleep -- Knowing the number -- The paper -- Unpopular opinions -- Solo travel -- paperwork -- Missed calls -- The Spanish-English dictionary -- Patience -- Ignoring people -- Dittos -- Seniority -- Looking out the window -- TV Guide -- Civility -- Receptionists -- Private observances -- Leaving a message -- Toys and games -- Maps -- Empathy -- Handwritten letters -- Old tech -- Being in the moment -- Spelling -- Record albums -- Wondering about the weather -- Bedtime reading -- The emergency breakthrough -- Your attention span -- Sleepaway camp -- RSVPs -- The social studies textbook -- Vacation -- The Filofax -- Eye contact -- Working independently -- Magazines -- Asking politely -- Airplane encounters -- Your checkbook -- Missing out -- Penmanship -- "Excuse me" -- Christmas letters -- Figuring out who that actor is -- Passing notes -- Sick days -- Secrets -- Card catalogs -- The college lecture -- Memory -- Movie theaters -- Losing the instruction manual -- The blind date -- The encyclopedia -- The new kid -- The view -- Scrabble tiles -- Humility -- Cliffsnotes -- A parent's undivided attention -- Touch-typing -- Photo albums -- Blocking things out -- Social cues -- Closure

"The acclaimed editor of The New York Times Book Review takes readers on a nostalgic tour of the pre-Internet age, offering powerful insights into both the profound and the seemingly trivial things we've lost. Remember all those ingrained habits, cherished ideas, beloved objects, and stubborn preferences from the pre-Internet age? They're gone. To some of those things we can say good riddance. But many we miss terribly. Whatever our emotional response to this departed realm, we are faced with the fact that nearly every aspect of modern life now takes place in filtered, isolated corners of cyberspace-a space that has slowly subsumed our physical habitats, replacing or transforming the office, our local library, a favorite bar, the movie theater, and the coffee shop where people met one another's gaze from across the room. Even as we've gained the ability to gather without leaving our house, many of the fundamentally human experiences that have sustained us have disappeared. In one hundred glimpses of that pre-Internet world, Pamela Paul, editor of The New York Times Book Review, presents a captivating record, enlivened with illustrations, of the world before cyberspace-from voicemails to blind dates to punctuation to civility. There are the small losses: postcards, the blessings of an adolescence largely spared of documentation, the Rolodex, and the genuine surprises at high school reunions. But there are larger repercussions, too: weaker memories, the inability to entertain oneself, and the utter demolition of privacy. 100 Things We've Lost to the Internet is at once an evocative swan song for a disappearing era and, perhaps, a guide to reclaiming just a little bit more of the world IRL"--