My pet theory is that the only major change is that there’s now much less of a filter over the information that reaches the populace. The regime can’t quite figure out yet how to deal with this without undermining its own legitimacy, flimsy as it may be. It used to be you had to go through the newspapers or tv to get anything out, and both are controlled by a very small group of people. To the extent that there was diversity of opinion it was because the two wings of the uniparty disagreed with one another. Nowadays trust in the press is at historic lows and actually reading it makes one _less_ informed than not reading anything at all. So people turn to social media and personalities they trust there. End result: an actual democracy could break out for the first time since Ancient Greece. The Uniparty can’t tolerate risking tens of trillions in money flows on some highfalutin’ bullshit like that.