The Digital Age
Introduction:
The dawn of the 2010's is right around the corner. Now is the time to reflect, to look back on what this decade will be known for. Where the 1960's had hippies, the 70's had disco, the 80's had rock and the 90's had funky colors on everything, the 2000's will be surely known as the digital age (or at least the start of it). In the last 10 years, everything from the internet to cell phones to video games has exploded onto the scene in ways bigger than ever before. In the end though, as with every decade before this one, a clear conclusion can be drawn. People are addicted to people. Every form of digital-representational-devices can be used to link people together in some form, be in direct or through a common bond over said device. The digital age is simply a new casing over the same product that is mankind.
Argument I:
Like Myspace before it, and Aim before that, and email prior to that (You can go back further to phones and even letters if you really want), Facebook is the top tool to connect the people of the world. Looking at the School of the Future graduating class of 2010, at least 69 different people have facebook accounts (Based on the friend list of myself, Henry Varona), and from that, a good 17 of those students were on it in the course of a 4 hour period (This is based on what they had posted online, they could have checked their facebook and not posted anything publicly). This is a common finding for American high school in New York City, and if expanded to the entire country similar ratios will be found to those on my friend list. So why do people go on it so often? Well I can't answer for everybody, but I go on it to connect with everybody I know online. I can talk through normal messaging, quizzes, notes (which reach a group of people), groups centered on a common thread, applications, pictures, and so much more. Facebook has changed the way people talk because you can talk in so many different ways. This is particularly attractive because it gives people the illusion of freedom, the choice to talk to their friends however they like and whenever they can. Facebook doesn't make you respond right away. Conversations that would take minutes in spoken word can take days or weeks on Facebook, making you feel like you are really connecting with somebody even if you aren't. You feel popular when you see how many people talk to you, you feel important in a way that you can look back on so you don't have to rely on memory. People can talk in such an easier fashion, it's no wonder that it's one of the top sites in the world.
Argument II:
The curse of the cellular telephone encompasses almost every American. With a phone on you, which many have or give their children so that they can be safe, you are never truly alone. You are connected to every single person in the world through a simple phone and thanks to this people can connect even more. Take a schoolroom environment for example, under the tables, in their bags, off to the side of the counter, cell-phones are used for texting, talking to people across the room, in the classroom next door, wherever. God-forbid anybody wait to talk to their friends or pay attention, everybody feels the need to be constantly connected to friends they want to be with now. Here's the kicker though, texting doesn't disappear once they go hang out with their friends. And that leads to the next example, a park. Imagine you are surrounded by 10 of your closest friends having a good time hanging out. You feel a vibrate coming from your pocket and you just got a text from somebody who couldn't make it, somebody who maybe doesn't fit into that particular group. So you text, and text and even with everything you need for social interaction available, you choose your phone over your friends to talk to even more. People are rarely satisfied by what they have ready for them at the moment and are constantly searching for more ways to talk to people and as a result more time face down at a screen. And that's not even including the applications they have now...
Argument III:
I love my XBox 360, I'm not going to lie about it or try and hide it. Having the range of games the system provides and the chance to play video games with people all around the world whenever I want to is a very special vice for me. Back in the 90's and early 2000's, video games were a staple of my childhood. When I wasn't out with my friends playing a sport or inside playing with toys, video games were king. I would invite my best friends over and we would play and yell and scream and have a good time. Now though, video games don't need a friend right next to you thanks to the internet. People can play from the safety of their own couch with their friend who is playing on their own couch. As a result, playing video games is a lot easier, but a side effect comes out of the situation. An online persona is created, reflecting your video game mentality. Like for me, I go from normality to a sarcastic shoot-you-in-the-back kind of guy, no respect unless you respect me. My friend who has the most insane temper in the world becomes a mellow, stay-in-the-back kind of guy. Everybody becomes a completely different person and this affects the way that certain people you interact with will see you, which is both good and bad, but in the end is not real.
Connections for Argument I:
This state that we are in did not come easily though. If you look at what I am discussing here, most of these things have been around for quite some time, so why is it that we now consider them to be such a big deal when grouped together (As they have been in the past by many other people)? Many reasons. For one, the graduating generation, AKA the class of 2010, grew up in a turbulent time for these digital-representational-devices. As we grew, so did the technology. Starting with dial-up as children, so that it was only a sometimes treat to go online, we slowly watched as the internet became more an more accessible as we became more capable of handling it. After dial-up came the Ethernet cord, which meant we could be on as often as we wanted as long as we had the cord plugged in, and we didn’t have to wait for the internet to boot up! After this, we had wifi, and suddenly as we reached high school, the typical point of rebellion, we could do whatever we wanted online whenever we wanted, not being able to be controlled and restrained by a cord.
As a result though, our key developmental stages where we become the person we are for the rest of our lives were assaulted by an onslaught of a new foe, the internet. Exposed to much more than we normally would be (In comparison with both previous generations and our natural world), many people were unable to separate themselves from the opportunities and experiences proposed to them. Take for instance, facebook. Facebook went from having 12 million users in the end of 2006 to having 50 million by October of 2007 (facebook.com). This surge took place during our grades freshmen and junior years, a time when most teenagers are starting to venture out on their own in terms of identity. Having so many people to be able to contact so much more often made people a big melting pot of selves, with depth being sacrificed for the quantity of friends. Reflecting on my early facebook days, nearly every conversation lasted less than 10 postings (Five each) and they were mainly conversations about what you had been up to lately and once wit was lost, the conversation was as well. 2 years later, facebook now has 300 million users, a grand leap given the span of time involved (facebook.com). Depth is still lost in the world of facebook, with only a rare conversation lasting, and even so it’s only because we are wittier now. This then affects how we interact with people in the real world and everybody winds up with a cocktail party mentality, walk around, mingle and tell funny jokes or stories, and repeat. Facebook has made this cocktail party spread to the world though, something we are much the weaker for.
This also leads one to wonder about future generations. Those younger than the class of 2010 will not have grown up with the gradual increase in the use of the internet, rather it will just be very in-your-face and they will be overwhelmed. This leads to a state much like feed, where everybody is plugged in all the time and eventually people lose the need or will to be an individual and thrive out on their own. This could be a major problem for the general success and evolution of society (At least American) and could result in a Wall-E like world.
Connections for Argument II:
Much like the predicament with the internet arose, texting and phone usage has undergone a similar chain of events. As children, we did not have cellular telephones on a large scale, but as we grew older, the popularity of them spread. Texting hit it big in the early 2000’s, right when our generation was reaching the later years of middle school and starting high school. Now, this has increased to the point where there are picture messages, video messages, and a multitude of full keyboards for constant texting. This has had much the same effect on youth as facebook has, with added convenience since it is a phone and much more common to find or keep with oneself. This too will then lead to future generations having a plugged-in state of mind.
Connections for argument III:
Significance:
In the long run these are all significant because they each have a tremendous impact on the foundation of the new society being built by today’s youth. The problem is not that people are addicted to people, but rather that it is quickly becoming an addiction that is worsening and harder to satisfy. If one person could be very close to you, you should be satisfied in yourself and your urge to know others. People in relationships can often support this (A functional, healthy relationship). However as people talk to an increasing amount of people on an increasing amount of devices they lose depth and connection, making hem crave more but then have even less depth, resulting in a circle that only worsens the situation and as a result causes future generations to be built upon a rotten bedrock.
Opposing Point of View:
I suppose you could disagree though, in many different ways. For one, there are those that would say people are addicted to the technology and not the people. The technology that people use is the focus of attention, not what lies through the other end of the screen. If people were indeed addicted to people you would see a state of chaos in which everybody is constantly running around talking to as many people as they possibly can or at the least they would be talking to multiple people at once. We of course do not see this in our daily lives, so how can people be addicted to others as proposed if we do not see this. The answer is simple; they never had the means to do so. No person can manage to maintain multiple conversations at once and do more than just add in blank filler sentences. However, these mediums provide something the real world does not, the conversation. By listing all that has been said it is much easier for people to talk to ten different people and feed their addiction.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, the 2000's will be known for the surge of digital-representational-devices. The multiple forms of digital-representational-devices are used to interact with people as often as possible but they do not present others with the truth and they separate you from reality. With Facebook relationships grow ever more casual, through texting people grow separated, and through video games our identity is presented in a fractured state. The sad thing is, none of these forms dictate that they have to be used like this, we have the potential to use them the in the same manner that people would interact normally, but we choose to have them veer in this direction, to distance ourselves from everybody else in order to feel included. Why is it that people feel the need to sabotage themselves in order to reach acceptance? Is it not that the devices we use are flawed but rather that humans are? It would seem so, but if you dig deeper into the issue, I'm sure that yet another layer of these issues will be revealed that will point in yet another direction and that nobody will find who is to blame and will instead have to take responsibility and fix things themselves.
Works Cited:
"Company Timeline". Facebook. November 7th, 2009
Anderson, M. T.. feed. Candlewick, 2004.
Standon, Andrew. Wall-E. Walt Disney Pictures, 2008.
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