tasmlab Posted June 13, 2013 Posted June 13, 2013 Classmates.com just digitized my 1985 high school yearbook and published it for the world. It made me think of how rare documentation on the mundanity of the average nim-noe was just a few decades ago. Now, hundreds of millions of individuals are posting like this, sharing anything from personal photos to breakfast updates on Facebook, and have their locations tracked via GPS perpetually, no matter how unimportant/uninteresting etc. If we think of phases of KEEPING historical record, we can probably chunk some very general periods: 2,000ish BC and earlier: Pre-history 2,000 BC - to 1700's: History is kept by a few literate gate keepers who write books 1700s to 2000: History is recorded by journalists who keep a fairly exaustive record of anything meritting news, even if it is the results of a small-town pie eating contest 2000 - ? : Mass digitization of the individual, where all events almost regardless of mundanity, regardless of any societal relevence, regardless of how important or unimportant the subject, is captured forever. And we are here to see it! Perhaps my great great grandchildren will look back at when we lived pre-2000 and ponder: "To think, people back then only had journalistic history to ignore. Now we ignore it all!"
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