it's heard 'round the world .... in about 2 nanoseconds.

We've all experienced this in some way shape or form - especially lately.

Many memories come screaming back to me ... and I must admit, not all of them are good. It's usually the bad news that travels fast - through Facebook updates, Orkut updates, text messages, away messages on AIM - "RIP Heath Ledger" or "___ is praying for the victims of the India bomb blasts" or "___is livid about the VT massacre"

Though I love my unlimited texting, FB, Orkut and AIM, every now and then, I wonder - where would we be if it weren't for technology? Like Professor Boellstorff spoke about in class...Our ancestors would have heard about the inauguration a good four months after the actual date had passed. So put yourself in an international context. Without technology, our cousins/family/friends would have never known about 9/11, our safety - the economic recession. Technology has become an inherent part of our culture. We've become immersed in symbols - so much so, that a simple colon and a sideways bracket has come to mean so much to us ... " :( " And it's not something that's limited to those living in the continguous US - technology has homogenized emotions through emoticons - perhaps some symbols no longer seem to be as arbitrary as we thought. The internet culture seems to mediate how we view the world, and how we experience life around us - and technology seems to help us keep up in this fast paced world by passing on the news to others the moment we receive it. The simple fact of elementary school kids getting Facebook now illustrates the fact that they're already becoming accustomed and encultured to our technology-driven lives.

Though I myself don't have a Twitter account, this article made me realize how much technology has become a part of our everyday lives - and how harmful and helpful it can both be at the same time. This is the cultural debate of our times. Though we hear necessary, important breaking news through our friends/colleagues on these social networking sites, the simple act of pressing a button and updating a status creates so much frenzy (good AND bad) around us. Culture's being shared in front of our eyes... The world's getting smaller ... and I can't wait to see what technology has in store next!