This rambles. It's quite random. But that's okay. A.D.D. boy is in town.
One wonders sometimes about the psychiatric and sociolical effects of more and more of our lives going online.
With
the introduciton of the graphical web browser in the 90's, you suddenly
saw an outlet for college students and scientists aross the world to
become self publishers. The most common thing that I remember seeing?
The "Home Page", which basically listed favorite bands, favorite movies,
links to other friends home pages, and maybe a photo or two.
Then
came the blog. Self-publishing really takes off with the click of a
few buttons. Soon, it seemed *everyone* was blogging. And what were
most of them? The Dear Diary variety, with people revealing not just
the boring details of their daily life, but the intimate "secrets" that
they would never talk about publically. But there it is for the world
to see. (As a side note, and I'm guilty of this on MySpace, those are
the dullest blogs. Give me something that's *about* something. Give me
something to take away. Make it about the reader.)
And
if they weren't online diaries, then they were technical or political
blogs. (I'm guilty on both counts.) Fun to write, maybe. But boring to
read.
Anyways, the main thing is that all of these people are sharing themselves in a BIG way online.
THEN
COMES WEB 2.0. Say what you like about that term, but it's taken hold.
By that I don't mean the whole interactive rich-client-like AJAX
whatever business. I mean the social web. Web sites became dynamic,
with their content updated by the users and visitors, not by the One Guy
to Rule Them All. del.icio.us, MySpace, Tribe, dailykos, any
CivicSpace site.
The Web as Meeting Place really has
taken off. MySpace is at, what, 50 million users. That's a big "city".
One where each user has their own home page listing -- hah! --
favorite musicians, movies, etc, with links to other friends home
pages., etc. Except that this website is dynamically updated by its
users. IT's a meeting place. People send messages there instead of via
email.
The most intersting thing I've seen their is the
way people user testimonials/comments there. Messages that once would
have been sent privately are now out there for everyone to see. Often
they are replies to private messages. I wonder what the ramifications
will be, both for those who embrace this communication style, and for us
fuddy-duddies that like old-school propriety.
Twill be interesting.