Are You Really Connected?

It is hard to say, at least for North Americans, that social media has not taken over our lives. A trend that began early this decade has undergone explosive growth and now has a place in the history books. If Facebook were a country, it would be the 7th largest in the world. Think of how much power Mark Zuckerberg has. If he posted his political views on the homepage, more than 400 million people would be forced to see it.

I think a lot of us can readily admit that we've developed a dependency on such conveniences. What is so compelling about YouTube, Facebook, Twitter? Is it the constant interaction? The desire to read into someone's life? Think about how much media is geared towards giving you a second life...any game with an avatar, say, Second Life; or any movie where you inhabit a host body through the power of mind, like Surrogates. This genres is built to give you another shot at life, this time around, having more control over what happens. Of course, people find this really compelling. So compelling, in fact, that a Chinese couple let their newborn baby starve at home as they played Second Life at two separate internet cafes. The ironic thing is, they were working over the internet to raise a virtual daughter.

It amazes me how lost we are without a stimulus. If you just imagine yourself taking a seat in the chair next to you and not doing A THING, can you do it? I can hardly imagine it; I would probably pull out my iPod or check my cellphone. It is disgusting. We are putting all our energy into being more places than once. You want to be in the homes of your readers via Twitter, or in the ears of your friends via cellphones. Stand in front of a public entrance; eg. a school or hotel. Notice the second people get out of the building they put their hand to their ears and begin chatting. Do they really have something meaningful to say??! How did we say these things before cellphones?

Our generation may possibly be remembered for our multi-tasking. We can do ten things where our parents could only do two. How many (browser) tabs do you have going right now? How many different conversations are you carrying on via text? Doing homework with the music on? And when we are not multi-tasking, we feel lost and bored. At work, do you check your Facebook? Play Brickbreaker? It seems as if everyone is connected to somewhere else; a virtual realm. However, Facebook usage will eventually decline, but then a new and improved, shiner form of social media will take its place. Currently, software developers are creating an application that allows you to access all you information from any social media site you may have membership. This means, instead of logging in and updating every status, you just input it in the application and it applies it to all of your sites.

Where will this all lead us? Is it a bad thing? I cant say for sure, the only thing I know, is that our kids are about to step into a world we never thought possible.

Education for sale!

Lately I've been thinking about the role of education. In particular, the influence of grade's kindergarten through 12. Are the teachers really there to help us maximize our potential or are they there as babysitters? Honestly, in my grade 12 year, I learned more on my own than in the classroom, thanks to Wikipedia.

I guess teachers are there to expose you to the many directions available; to illuminate the pathways. But it still seems as if we are being taught how to be a respectable worker. Show up on time, have your work done by the deadline, collaborate with peers, ask assistance from superiors, and produce a fine finished product. These are the essentials that are ingrained into us by our mentors. Think about how restricting this is; it starves off the creative process. Artistic human beings don't allow time constraints to limit them, a lack of resources to hold them back, or the judgment of others to influence their work.

Is school simply a manufacturing plant for robots that don't break rules? Robots whose performance is graded according to how well they 'stayed within the box'. The greatest minds in history were the ones that strayed from the pack. The eccentric Albert Einstein or the volatile Van Gogh. Many people of socially conformed society labeled them mad, but they've made some of the biggest contributions to the human race.

School isn't a bad thing, but it could be greatly improved. One suggestion: philosophy being requisite in every grade. The pursuit of knowledge will set the mind free. If you aim for enlightenment, you will see the sun.

Freedom