(Beau Sia) Neo vs. Traditional Communication

"technologica"

is how we choose to interface a problem? i guess. shortage of coherent essays, eh? people too afraid to take a random shot in the dark at a bar? thailand has more dirt and bugs than it does on the telly? the world, with all its various fences and long range signals changing things more than just in the marketplace? how deep is the shift of exponential technological advancement? probably fairly deep, i suppose. non-confrontational, are we?

of course, unless we're anonymous. where you can't see our faces or our flags. where all recourse takes place on a plane none have ever touched with their mortal hands. and all the fear we feel in real life finds itself in our comments about everything. our absolute opinions about the people we've never met. our understanding of the work we don't acknowledge our own limitations of understanding.

so ready to take action when the sword and the gun is weightless. prepared to kill those we'll never have to explain, 'why?' to. it's understood, afterall. goals so easy when failure and success are in the hands of a rendered image of oneself. the impact of the game only deals in points and checkpoints, so why address the causality of such actions in the tangible universe? besides, who has time to share one's motives for anger. for running over people. just feel it and do it in a world where whim is celebrated.

how can we celebrate ourselves when standards and cause for celebration have been elevated to fantasy? what good are we, if the edited frame is perfect and flawless? what is our best self in the presence of finely crafted ideas presented by teams of well-paid sellers of people? why would we be who we really are, if there isn't airtime for it? if there are no ads purchased because of it? if ratings don't endorse it? if it's not water cooler worthy, as they say.

what can you say without looking like a complete fool? why allow yourself to be seen as a complete fool? why be rejected beyond one's control? why share the guts of it, and then be laughed at? do you know how painful that is? with all the things that could be said about you on the internet? all the blogs and candid photos that could ruin your ideas of yourself. all the people in the world who would only have a moment to catch what's most embarrassing about you, dismiss you, and leave you alone, wondering why you venture out at all?

does it really have to be about language? can't it be about emoticons? emoticons don't recognize your accent. they don't require understanding sarcasm. they help prevent you from having to call on the phone to express the proper tone of the sentiment. and words? why not a format that removes the need for nuance? why not a format that encourages brevity? why not a way that everything can be point a to point b, without any obstacle or chance of misinterpretation in-between? why not a shorthand that takes race out of cultural framing? that becomes its own language in the world, with numbers and clipped letters. the beats would be proud.

what incentive is there to face that which would make our lives uncomfortable? aren't we supposed to look for ease around every corner? isn't it most beneficial to try and make everything in our world effortless? isn't effort considered negative? isn't it in our best interests to ensure that everything we do has the least possible chance of a negative outcome, such as judgement, rejection, and interpretation?

so is it the gadgets? is it time to blame the gadgets? the plots of gadgets and gadget makers? shall we send them a very angry letter about the ruining of our youth? about the collapse of society? about removing the human element from our inherently human selves? robots? are we going to be killed by robots? the they prophesied in film and tv? under who's direction? ah yes, beyond our control.

well, as an avid social networking site guy (not in the random hook-ups way. i am old, afterall. tee hee.), who has many a toy requiring precious electricity, i have this to say:

a hammer can build a house, or it can smash someone's eye socket in.

floss can clean one's teeth or be a tripwire for one's enemies.

brushes can paint our heart's desire, or cover up our insecurities.

a tool is under the control of its user (until we get them ones that make our minds do what they say (unless we already have them, but don't fully understand the idea of cookies and embedded quantum baloney.)).

the root of the matter is not the iphone. it is the culture which elevates a product to the status of fulfilling one's life. it is parents forced away from children in order to make money to buy the things that fulfill one's life. it is the gradual deterioration of our ability to confront the reality of our situation. it is the fear of pain even if ease is equally useless to us. it is time, and the pressure to fill time with only the best imported cheeses, sports highlights, drunkest hour of the drunkest evening, hottest hotties that are obviously hot 'cuz we've seen a magazine, and the newest new with new stickers on it. otherwise, we are wasting time, aren't we? do you need an emoticon after that statement? if you took speed-reading, you may have missed some of what was set-up in the context of the rest of the piece. just saying, is all.

i'll blame the internet when it puts a gun to my head. not being absolute, but why give the internet that much power? is it already alive on its own? is technology the problem? i think it's a lack of reverse engineers when it comes to the human condition. and... scene.