Robert Clark, “It was a whole new world.”

Robert Clark, a collectibles store clerk born in 1974, details in his first interview his early experiences with computers in his childhood as a member of a middle class military family living in California and Hawaii, as well as, his experiences as an adult with the early internet, which was to him a new world of convenience, connectivity, and entertainment.

In a follow up interview Robert Clark details his experiences with the beginnings of social media on the internet including his experiences of being an early adopter of MySpace, Facebook, and Twitter. As a result he provides insight into the fledgling forms of each of these major networks and the role they played in fostering connectivity and engagement through the internet medium. Secondly, Robert discusses his experience with early internet piracy with sites like Napster, while also detailing the community that surrounds such sites including discussions of their culture and philosophy.