It’s not all Twitter mobs – the internet can be a force for good

Few readerships of any intelligent national magazine will be more alive to the perils and downsides of 21st–century cyber-life than you, fellow Spectator readers. Many of you might share my use of the generalised expression ‘the internet’ for the whole damn thing — while not being quite sure what we’re referring to.

Few, on the other hand, will be more likely to show a lively appreciation of community, locality, the sense of belonging and of place that even in this fast-paced and mobile age, our country at its best can still nurture.

You might think those two dispositions make comfortable bedfellows. The faithful little band of stalwarts at Evensong, the public–spirited pensioner out on the lane collecting litter, the retired major logging each developing pothole… these are not people you would expect to want to know much about Snapchat, or how to link Spotify, their smartphone and their domestic sound systems to bring them highlights from Iolanthe at breakfast.