So That's Life?

“When you’re low down and dirty, from walkin’ the street
With your old hurdy gurdy, no one to meet
Said love ain’t the same on the south side of town
You could look but you ain’t gonna find it around”

For those of you who have been faithful readers, my frustration with social networking and the twin issues of applicability and TMI (too much information) might be getting tiresome. But as I pointed out in a previous post, social media is reaching a tipping point where the critical mass will either relegate it to the commonplace or catapult it into the stratosphere.  While some people ordered prime rib, I’m expecting meatloaf.

For those of you unfamiliar with the term Web 2.0, you might think that it was the new-and-improved version of the original Internet. Even for the technically savvy, the term was originally mistaken for IPv6 which is the next generation of internet protocol (IP). It has the ring of newness in the same way that… In reality, the novelty is more akin to Compassionate Conservatism or Van Halen III.  In reality, some marketing genius came up with the term to sell the services to more users. They adopted the time-tested method of incrementing a number to indicate change and sent their minions of pseudo-journalists out into the fray to trumpet the new savior of the Internet. It’s kind of like saying Bush II was an improvement over Bush I!

Now I’m not going to sit here and pretend that changes aren’t fast and furious in cyberspace. New products and services are continually released and there are some incredibly fascinating offerings out there. What I am going to tell you is that Web 2.0 is a sham, a farce, and Three-card Monte game all rolled into one. And, the beneficiaries of the scam are the makers of portable devices and software developers looking for new frontiers to offer their wares. There are some terrific services out there and Twitter, MySpace, and Facebook are prime examples. They provide some incredible functionality but they aren’t quantum leaps.

I mention this not to denigrate the offerings but rather as a warning. For everyone who thinks that social media is the cure-all that will bring the world closer and facilitate a flat-world view, you need to wake up. Web 2.0 is not a magic wand that you can wave and instantly make all the children play nice together.  This still requires good old-fashioned organization work at the lowest levels with a lot of sweat. Social media is a great tool but, as the saying goes, when all you have is a hammer, everything starts looking like nails. If you pin all your hopes in organizing people or disseminating a message on it, you’re doomed to failure. However, if you add it to your arsenal of communications tools, it can be an invaluable asset.

There used to be a time when spilling your guts out about lost love and the horrors of life and death was strictly the purview of of poets, authors, and songwriters. They carefully crafted their words to convey a sense of place and a range of emotion. Done well, they imparted a lasting impression on the reader or listener.

I was reading two online stories this morning, one about the horrific death of a young girl in a car crash and another detailing the willingness of people to confess their deepest, darkest secrets on the Internet. Both struck me as being symptomatic of a blurring of the lines between privacy and openness. They also reminded me that how a message is conveyed is just as important as the facts.

In the case of the teenage girl, gruesome photos of her corpse were somehow leaked by the Highway Patrol officers who were at the scene. These pictures quickly found their way onto the Internet where her family was confronted by the terrible images. Making the case even worse, the images were appropriated by strangers who made unfounded assumptions about the cause of the accident and the character of the unfortunate girl. Needless to say, the toothpaste was out of the tube and there is no way to eliminate these pictures. In their grief, the parent’s have attempted legal actions which have thus far proved futile.

In the other story, research seems to show that, when people are exposed to evidence that others are revealing their innermost secrets, they are more likely to admit to their own indiscretions. If someone is shown a fake survey result showing how other people are cheating on their spouses, a subject is much more likely to admit to cheating on their taxes.

Given the proliferation of personal data on the Internet, (and especially social media sites like Facebook) you can’t hardly go a day without being exposed to either a grisly image or a personal detail that you would have previously found offensive. I’d imagine that a majority of people would avoid these things but it seems like this is becoming increasingly harder to do. For example, in the case of the car crash, the girl’s father received an email with the picture attached. I could rage against this insensitivity but the reality is that people rarely think before sending email. And, this behavior is a symptom of something darker than rudeness.

Humans are, by nature, curious creatures. It’s what keeps us evolving and weeds out the dullards from the crafty. It is what compels parents to intercede when their child tries to stick a fork in the outlet and cheer when this same inquisitiveness leads to a Nobel prize. But when it comes to the mundane details of everyday life (and even death), inquiry turns into prying and curiosity into nosiness. Just knowing the facts and seeing images never provides the background underpinnings necessary to fully appreciate the situation.

As for me, when I want to feel sad, happy, horrified, or exhilarated, I stick to music. And, when I want to feel the pain of emotional loss, the words of Jani Lane seem appropriate:

“And I saw red when I opened up the door
I saw red, my heart just spilled onto the floor
And I didn’t need to see his face…
Cause I saw yours
I saw red and then I closed the door
And I don’t think I’m gonna love you anymore”