To Tweet or Not to Tweet ? That is the question. Or…is it? In the constantly evolving world of modern communication, can we even afford to question whether or not to plunge ourselves wholeheartedly into the online community?
Web-communication’s most recent development is Twitter; taking the simplest part of Facebook – the status update – and doing-away with all the excess nonsense that normally comes with it. Instead of making a long-winded profile about yourself, complete with all the useless information that nobody is interested to read – birth town, political views, religious beliefs and favourite quotations for example – Twitter asks of us only that we answer one simple question; “What are you doing?”
A couple of years ago, I would probably have phoned the police in a panic if a website asked me such a question, but today I feel almost empowered to respond with a cheeky “What aren’t I doing…” or maybe an ironic “Writing about what I am doing…”. Regarding our actual Tweets (since both those responses are terribly lame), there is something very ego-soothing about typing your daily activities into the internet, in the firm belief that SOMEBODY is out there and is interested. It’s a classically human trait to crave attention - even justification - and it makes me wonder; has the internet actually become the new God? It knows everything, we turn to it in times of need and, most importantly, it provides us with that comforting feeling that there is always somebody out there that cares. In the absence of a God that created us, have we gone ahead created a God for ourselves - in the form of one another?
Perhaps, but I digress. So, blasphemous thoughts aside, I wonder; at the rate at which technology is advancing, how much longer before even Twitter is made redundant? How long before even the need to physically type out our thoughts is eradicated? Would it really be such a huge step forwards to have everybody wired into one massive, extelligent mind, wherein all our mental chemical balances are monitored to provide an accurate representation of our emotional state and mental functioning at any time? Hell, combined with GPS chips in our necks, microphone implants beneath the tongues and tiny speakers in our auditory canals and we may as well be in The Sims! We could even wear hats that display our current needs to allow other people to treat in the most appropriate manner; when “Toilet” starts flashing red, for example, everybody can run for cover!
One might ask the question; would that really be such a bad thing? We, as humans, rarely know what is right for us at the best of times – need some evidence? Just look outside! The world is dying and what is our solution? Biodegradable shopping bags; woooo! A small step in the right direction for sure but, in a race to save the entire world, I get the feeling we should try running. But then again we, the little people, need leaders. So what can we expect when the government that we put in power to protect and serve us, steal our money and send us to war when we explicitly say no? The fact that we haven’t rebelled and overthrown these people already is probably a decent indication that we are in no position to take control of our own existence, let alone that of the planet!
But maybe that is the point; have we become so engrossed in documenting our own little lives in Facebook pictures and Twitter updates that we have lost sight of the bigger issues? I know for a fact that I spend many more hours updating my band’s Facebook group than I do applying for jobs; I also spend many more evenings on my Xbox, increasing the stats of my created wrestlers on WWE Raw vs. Smackdown than I do in the gym. Somehow, somewhere I have become utterly disengaged with the real world…and I don’t know to what extent documenting my every lack of movement in Twitter will help…
Clearly I am exaggerating the issue; I may be able to accurately relate my feelings to appropriate emoticons, but I haven’t yet got as far as using “lol” in spoken conversation – that would be ridiculous. The question I am raising though is just that; how far is too far? Meeting your future wife online also seems acceptable, but what about falling in love with another person’s World of Warcraft character? Clearly it is not up to me to judge these things; I’m just thinking that maybe we should pay attention to just how much of our lives we commit to the web.
So, to Tweet or not to Tweet? In my opinion, it depends who you are; if you have a lot of interesting things to say and show people – go for it! If you, like me, are rather uninteresting – leave it to Jonathon Ross yeah? But, whatever you do, remeber that one day even Twitter will be redundant; don’t pour so much of your life into it that, when this day comes around, you are left with nothing but a lot of updates about your eating and sleeping habits.
And that concludes my first Blueclaw post. Huzzah and hooray! Keep reading 
