“Cross-continental” reach but the world is a smaller place. Rumors and lies spreading like wildfire through the populace have caused major countrywide social unrest and even revolts in the past.
They spread just as far, just more slowly, because you couldn’t get it all directly from the same person instantly. The government reaction also therefore took longer. But this factor for obvious reasons made “misinformation” worse!
So no, this is still not substantively different. The primary difference is still that we are returning to the way things were before broadcast media controlled by a small number of people. Unless they can stop it.
I have relatives on the East Coast horrified at things that happened in Seattle, Washington. They believe that most cities are like that. They have no ability to discern stories from three time zones over from stories happening in their backyard; it's all coming in over the same internet.
So no, I don't think we're returning to the past. I think we're entering a new future, one with uncharted territory. The past gives us no particular guarantees that people are capable of handling this level of noise, let alone focused culture jamming and intentional exploitation of the new speed and reach of communication.
The exact same things happened with people on different sides of the Roman Empire.
Again, the reach is not new! Nor is the speed - it’s just before only the Right People could do it, excepting maybe AM radio.
Before that, the reach was still as far as people spoke your language - it just took longer and people relied more on hearing what you said from someone else, until the invention of the printing press. Information still spread rapidly and if anything, people were more likely to take action due to the greater level of social cohesion in most times.
People have always had a burning desire for “news”, and the primary source for millennia was rumor.
I think we're using completely different definitions of "rapidly" if you're talking about the Roman empire and I'm talking about nearlight from one side of a continent to another.
People organized a nationwide attack on the US Capitol in 2021. It was a tiny fraction of the population that wanted to participate (much less participated), but they organized and came in from everywhere. What would that organization have looked like in Roman times?
They spread just as far, just more slowly, because you couldn’t get it all directly from the same person instantly. The government reaction also therefore took longer. But this factor for obvious reasons made “misinformation” worse!
So no, this is still not substantively different. The primary difference is still that we are returning to the way things were before broadcast media controlled by a small number of people. Unless they can stop it.