There's a commercial running now that got my attention
and gave me pause last night. That almost never happens. My attention span for
commercials is zero. Whenever anyone says, “Hey, have you seen that
commer...” I’m like, NO.
But Bing got me and the flow of thoughts that came out of
my head is disturbing.
The commercial tells the story of how Bing works for you
to make your life awesome. It lets you announce you're going on a trip, for
instance, and then collect all the awesome suggestions all your “friends” have
about the place you’re visiting, and then lets you go to all the awesome places
that everyone recommends complete with images, and longitude and latitude, and
hidden markers, and special things to ask for of the tall waiter with a limp in
that restaurant on the corner.
And then I froze. Bing does not make your life awesome.
It sucks the fun right out of everything.
What do you miss when everything is planned out and
guaranteed to be awesome? What if you never learn how to explore or take
chances on possible bad plans, make bad decisions that you then learn from, or
experience shocking surprises?
Let’s call it what it is: “pre-screened fun”, and
it’s a fucking shame.
Pre-screened fun destroys adventure. And even more
insidious, you might actually think you’re being adventurous anyway. But you’ll
be on somebody else’s adventure and it’s been cleared for takeoff according to
the general population’s needs and wants. And that’s not the same thing.
What if this is the only way Guy and I ever traveled.
What would we have missed out on?!
Excuse me a moment, I’m horrified.
Guy and I would have probably gone to the official
Git-Git Falls in Bali, and not stumbled upon a small section of it run by a
one-eyed guy and his frat-boy friend just trying to make a buck. That was
interesting. We didn’t know if we could trust them any step of the way and this
made the experience thrilling and rich. In the end we learned not to judge
frat-boys and one-eyed people as scam artists—that Bali is different—and we got
a private Falls tour. WOULND’T HAVE HAPPENED WITH BING.
And when we were on the Big Island of Hawaii and were
four-wheeling down endless dirt roads looking for any possible renegade camping
spot, careening towards a classic Hawaiian sunset, we would have known that
off-road camping isn’t advised in Hawaii for very good reason (and so probably
wouldn’t have gone). And we would have known that we would come upon the
massive burial site of King Kamamamahamahama all of sudden on said dirt road.
But we didn't, and it was such a surprise! WOULDN’T HAVE HAPPENED WITH BING.
Or what about when we were in Bangkok and decided we
wanted to see Patpong at 10pm one night during the King’s Birthday Weekend. We
wouldn’t have gone outside to talk to the tuk-tuk driver to find out that
Patpong closes early on that weekend, and we wouldn’t have been directed by him
to a crazy illegal prostitute bar and then further directed to an even crazier
illegal disco on an epic adventure that lasted all night long! No, we would
have known that Patpong was closed and probably would have rested up in our
room for the Next Day’s Big Plans of all the awesome things people told us to
do. We would have missed out on so much...it's hard to imagine how it
WOULDN’T HAVE HAPPENED WITH BING.
This loss of self is so sad, and just one indicator of
the social networking epidemic. It spreads with such stealth, I'm afraid
someday I'll forget what it's like to live in a regular world, not a networked
one. I'm the least in danger of that than anyone I know, and it’s still
scary.
This post is about knowing too much and the detriment to
creativity and invention that is. It's also about what happens when
everyone does your work for you. Laziness ensues and you don't even know it's
happening.
It's less about stupid social networking and more about
that.
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