The Daily Minutiae

A lot of people would wonder why I like this article so much.  To us echo-boomers, it doesn't say anything we haven't heard of before.  In fact, for most of us, it's talking about things we drench our lives in everyday.  I guess a textbook topic name for it would be: "a glance at how social networking websites are bringing the world together."

That's all face-value.  What drew me to the article was the fact that it was written somebody who actually remembers life before the 'net.  We take the news feed on Facebook like it's always been there.  Granted there were some things they mentioned I had to give a look like Twitter and some things like "ambient awareness" that really left a little more knowledgeable.  

The writer of this story throws around words like "phenomenon," "paradox," and even "E.S.P." for Facebook and sites like it but really it was going to happen sooner or later.  This one's for you, Professor Stewart.  The Fourth Truth "They" Don't Want You to Know about the Media: Nothing's new.  First it was telephone.  I'm sure nobody was seeing cell phones and look where we are now: GPS, text messaging, video messaging, new kewl ringtones.  The technology was there and Zuckerberg used it.

I thought it was weird, that bit about how many people we can keep tabs on at one time.  Scientists say 150, a little bigger than my graduating class.  Maybe that dopey small town I came from wasn't so bad after all.

That's how they get us.  We can't possibly imagine what the next great thing will be, only hope that we can afford it.  There you go, the future of marketing and advertising: let people put in tell you what they're interested and suffer them your pitch.

Sometimes I wonder what somebody years and years ago would think if we went in a time machine and brought them back.  The Founding Fathers would be smiling, I think, and the ancient Romans would say we were gods.