Web 2.0 or just getting back to where we left off?

Regarding technology and Web 2.0 -

I wonder if we are just picking up where we left off in social intensity? Up until, say, post WW2 we lived in compressed social worlds. After WW2 we got suburbs which threw us far away from each other and TVs which pulled us inside and alone. Now maybe we are recovering and getting back to the front porch conversations we left off in 1948...

--Thanks to MaryLynn Tobin for pointing me to this NYT Editorial..I’ve Got Mail