Recently CollegeHumor put out the funniest video I’ve seen on the internet in a long time… The dancing are singing are great and lyrics are both clever and hilarious!
I dedicate this post to Bora, PhysioProf, Isis, Vanessa, Arikia, and everyone I’ve had the pleasure of getting lost on the internet with.
Best line: ‘Pandora! I just found a site called Pandora… And suddenly equipped like I’m hanging out at hipster bars!‘
David Veverka was one of my first friends on facebook. These days I don’t know the majority of the people I’m connected to, but back in 2005, it was just a small network of folks who were really friends. He’s had this profile picture up for three years, but it’s a good choice considering he pursued marine mammalogy. We met when I was in graduate school at UMaine because David ran the Society for Conservation Biology. He had a coveted NSF Fellowship and was also the only person who volunteered to help dissect sea cucumbers for my thesis research. The other lab assistants were work study students, but David just thought cukes were interesting and wanted to learn more about them–despite that it involved a three hour commute to the marine lab. Needless to say that even back then, I knew he would go on change the world by saving biodiversity and educating the next generation about why it matters.
But on May 8, 2006, the makeshift bomb that exploded near his truck in Iraq didn’t know what he was supposed to go on and accomplish. Neither did the people who built it.
David lives on in the hearts and memories of those he touched. He also still lives on the internet. Facebook continues to alert me about his birthday and his photo often appears on the left side of my screen. His profile remains static–aside from an occasional wall message–while I’ve aged three years and changed a great deal. And in many ways my page has documented the transition from sea cucumbers to science policy and journalism.
For centuries, people have pieced together the past through art, oral tradition, yellowing photographs, and fading print. In my own family, much of the story has been lost. Today, social networking sites allow us to leave deeper footprints behind. We’ve only been walking this boundless beach for a short time, but I wonder how the space will evolve as the internet generation matures. We’re already living on and in the net, and when we leave this world, we no longer cease to exist. Perhaps someday my great-grandchild will explore the ancient technology of the 21st century and find The Intersection while searching for clues about me. And sure, servers go down, systems crash, and it won’t be long before my macbook air becomes obsolete. But like David, many of us are leaving a virtual bookmark in time.
Chris and I have spent a lot of time discussing Twitter over the past few days, both online and off. Along with Physioprof and James, we have a pact to resist joining the dark side. And the movement is growing…
Still, it’s been a big week for Twitter. In a twist of irony, the same day we posted on the phenom, Discover launched its official Twitter feed. And right now, a top headline on CNN’s frontpage reports that Ashton Kutcher has reached 1 million Twitter followers in his battle with the station. In other words, more folks are following ‘That 70’s Show’s Michael Kelso than than the actual news…and that itself has become the news. I’m not sure whether we can glean any large scale significant clues here about the evolution of American culture, but it strikes me odd nonetheless.
Chris noted this week’s scientific finding that rapid-fire media may confuse our moral compass and just yesterday, another story on CNN reported moms are at risk for internet addiction. Addiction? While I’m thankfully not (yet) among users who ‘don’t bathe and abuse drugs to help them stay “up” for more online time‘, I often get the feeling that Chris and I are on our laptops more than we should be. Scaling out, it’s clear that many of us are spending a good deal of time interacting with others in privacy. While the world grows smaller by way of globalization and the worldwide web, we’re becoming increasingly accustomed to social interaction amid social isolation.
I haven’t decided how I feel about all of this, but the week’s proceedings have me seriously thinking about how people are inherently changing. And what about the aforementioned risk? Are we really capable of becoming addicted to the web? As ever more of us become virtually wired much of the time, could we be approaching The Matrix? That question is mainly in jest of course, but just for the sake of discussion…
If it’s happening, would anyone notice before it’s too late?
