I wonder if the urge to document being there has been around for a long time. When I toured Mammoth Cave in Kentucky (world’s longest cave system), at one point we entered a large chamber and the guide pointed out all the marks on the ceiling. Apparently since the very beginning of this cave as a tourist attraction, people would hoist someone up with a candle. Holding the candle just below the ceiling left a sooty mark. Thus it could be used as a very slow writing implement. I saw dozens of sooty names and dates going back to the early 1800s. That sounds a lot like the selfie impulse.
Bryan Cranston as Hal in Malcolm: he’s had some good roles over the years, hasn’t he? From a recurring role as Tim Whatley the dentist in Seinfeld to Walter White in Breaking Bad.
I think we will all get bored of this narcissistic obsession with social media and things will change - which is not to say that they will change for the better. Maybe it's my age, but we seem so obsessed with how fast and simply we can do things now, we wan't immediate results. We have lost the joy in the process and put too much value in the result.
Thanks for a great read. Really enjoyed it. As a child of the analogue era, I definitely recognized myself in this. Since I quit FB 2 years ago, I do post very occasionally for work on Instagram, but even still, some of it is “look at me/us” cringeworthy.
I love how you write about social media brain! I too stopped posting much after I noticed I wasn’t enjoying my actual adventures, just getting high by myself at my computer because somebody I haven’t seen since 7th grade gave them a knee jerk like. I was also worried about what it would look like to my three young kids-- an addiction, and a sad one I hoped they wouldn’t emulate.
I used to shoot off an entire roll of 24 photos for concert-going, then wait to find out if anything was worth keeping. Yep, the olden days. 😁
The funnier thing is, I haven't keep a single one of those negatives or the prints. The image of the experience was eventually disposable, I knew where I'd been. How much more disposable images are decades later, because of digital technology, and because of social media.
I still keep family albums. Yes, I make family look at them. 😂
I'm late to this discussion but I appreciated this essay very much. I have struggled to figure out my relationship with various platforms. I'm a writer and I want to connect with people. At the same time, I am occasionally flattened by a feeling of oppression. I've given myself permission to engage how and when I want to. I've seen the cliff side park where i walk every morning fill with people and trash since it became a destination in IG. I used to take pictures but now I don't.
I enjoyed this and I agree with you. We really do not need to post everything for people we mostly don't know.
I wonder if the urge to document being there has been around for a long time. When I toured Mammoth Cave in Kentucky (world’s longest cave system), at one point we entered a large chamber and the guide pointed out all the marks on the ceiling. Apparently since the very beginning of this cave as a tourist attraction, people would hoist someone up with a candle. Holding the candle just below the ceiling left a sooty mark. Thus it could be used as a very slow writing implement. I saw dozens of sooty names and dates going back to the early 1800s. That sounds a lot like the selfie impulse.
Bryan Cranston as Hal in Malcolm: he’s had some good roles over the years, hasn’t he? From a recurring role as Tim Whatley the dentist in Seinfeld to Walter White in Breaking Bad.
I think we will all get bored of this narcissistic obsession with social media and things will change - which is not to say that they will change for the better. Maybe it's my age, but we seem so obsessed with how fast and simply we can do things now, we wan't immediate results. We have lost the joy in the process and put too much value in the result.
Thanks for a great read. Really enjoyed it. As a child of the analogue era, I definitely recognized myself in this. Since I quit FB 2 years ago, I do post very occasionally for work on Instagram, but even still, some of it is “look at me/us” cringeworthy.
I love how you write about social media brain! I too stopped posting much after I noticed I wasn’t enjoying my actual adventures, just getting high by myself at my computer because somebody I haven’t seen since 7th grade gave them a knee jerk like. I was also worried about what it would look like to my three young kids-- an addiction, and a sad one I hoped they wouldn’t emulate.
Really enjoyed this
I used to shoot off an entire roll of 24 photos for concert-going, then wait to find out if anything was worth keeping. Yep, the olden days. 😁
The funnier thing is, I haven't keep a single one of those negatives or the prints. The image of the experience was eventually disposable, I knew where I'd been. How much more disposable images are decades later, because of digital technology, and because of social media.
I still keep family albums. Yes, I make family look at them. 😂
I'm late to this discussion but I appreciated this essay very much. I have struggled to figure out my relationship with various platforms. I'm a writer and I want to connect with people. At the same time, I am occasionally flattened by a feeling of oppression. I've given myself permission to engage how and when I want to. I've seen the cliff side park where i walk every morning fill with people and trash since it became a destination in IG. I used to take pictures but now I don't.