It's hard to believe how long ago this was. I first heard the news of the first plane hit from the Howard Stern show while driving in to work...
Technology sure has changed a lot since then. Cell phones were becoming common but I wouldn't have one until 2003 or 2004. The very first camera phone didn't arrive in the U.S. until near the end of 2002. I already had broadband at home and internet at work but the internet was a different place then. I was still using CRT TVs and monitors...I think i had a dual Pentium III system on my desk... If this attack had happened just a few years later, there would have been millions of cell phone photos and videos but as it is, there are really only a relative handful.
In a way, it is easy to blame technology and the Internet for many of the problems we have. I don't think it is that though centralization of social media has certainly played a role. Otherwise, the massive increase in the availability of information should be making everybody more well informed. Unfortunately, it isn't always easy to filter out the opinion, fake news and other faulty or incomplete information.
Tech sure has progressed by leaps and bounds. I think I had a cell phone around 2002 or so but it was a very primitive grey Motorola flip phone with green digital numbers. I had a dummy terminal connected to a mainframe and an ancient Mac on my desk for desktop publishing.
I do agree that tech and social media have ushered in a new level of f*ckery. It gives those in power so many more ways to manipulate the masses. If you haven't seen them already these two docs highlight some ways in which it's happening...
https://www.netflix.com/title/80117542
https://www.netflix.com/title/81254224
We're about to enter an even more frightening world with the advent of A.I. and more sophisticated deep fakes.