A devastating, devastating!, take on social networking tools from Nicholas Carr. I don't know when I've read a few sentences that seemed so deftly to sum up what we're doing to ourselves in this modern world.
Narcissism is just the user interface for nihilism, of course, and with artfully kitschy services like Twitter we're allowed to both indulge our self-absorption and distance ourselves from it by acknowledging, with a coy digital wink, its essential emptiness. I love me! Just kidding!
The great paradox of "social networking" is that it uses narcissism as the glue for "community." Being online means being alone, and being in an online community means being alone together. The community is purely symbolic, a pixellated simulation conjured up by software to feed the modern self's bottomless hunger. Hunger for what? For verification of its existence? No, not even that. For verification that it has a role to play. As I walk down the street with thin white cords hanging from my ears, as I look at the display of khakis in the window of the Gap, as I sit in a Starbucks sipping a chai served up by a barista, I can't quite bring myself to believe that I'm real. But if I send out to a theoretical audience of my peers 140 characters of text saying that I'm walking down the street, looking in a shop window, drinking tea, suddenly I become real. I have a voice. I exist, if only as a symbol speaking of symbols to other symbols.
The great paradox of "social networking" is that it uses narcissism as the glue for "community." Being online means being alone, and being in an online community means being alone together. The community is purely symbolic, a pixellated simulation conjured up by software to feed the modern self's bottomless hunger. Hunger for what? For verification of its existence? No, not even that. For verification that it has a role to play. As I walk down the street with thin white cords hanging from my ears, as I look at the display of khakis in the window of the Gap, as I sit in a Starbucks sipping a chai served up by a barista, I can't quite bring myself to believe that I'm real. But if I send out to a theoretical audience of my peers 140 characters of text saying that I'm walking down the street, looking in a shop window, drinking tea, suddenly I become real. I have a voice. I exist, if only as a symbol speaking of symbols to other symbols.
Now, do I feel more real for having posted this quote on my blog? I'm going to power down, put down my iPod, walk out the door and not come back until I've thought of an answer to that.
UPDATE: I didn't think of an answer, but I did try on hats at a department store. OMG, silly or what??
Well, *I* for one feel more real for--
*beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep*
*silence*
Posted by: Pete | April 19, 2009 at 07:15 PM
Hello Jonathan. Just discovered woobiquity. Lots of lovely stuff. Beautiful writing, so spare and clear.
I sent another translation last week. Are you still picking up mail from 26bloggers? One more to come at some point then I will be done.
I don't have a direct email for you
See you soon. Tom
Posted by: Tom Lynham | May 12, 2009 at 11:25 AM