Consider the impacts of the smartphone. Nobody except Steve Jobs knew we needed them, but once they were invented, they took over most people’s lives (not mine–I don’t have one). They give us instant access to everything from breaking political news to cat videos. We can communicate around the globe at the speed of light and at minimal cost. Our attention spans are much shorter; we crave constant stimulation, and mostly get it. It is a different world than the one I knew as a child, for better and for worse.
Marx was right about the impacts of technological change on culture, but wrong to focus exclusively on the means of production and the class system. In reality, immensely important cultural changes can result from innovations in the means of destruction (think of the social and political changes that arose from the widespread use of guns), the means of transportation, and the means of communication–not just the means of production.