Another year gone by, and what is left of it are not the memories in your heart, or those moments of hard work or absolute indolence written beautifully in your secret diary. But what really is left behind are the Facebook photographs capturing those moments, and the status updates echoing what was on your mind, at some point of time.
It's strange and convenient at the same time, the fact that we don't have our past spiritually with us, but its even better, its virtually with us. The moments of pure bliss, sheer anger, claustrophobic frustrations, existential angst, all are present somewhere in the infinite spaces of the world wide web. Today the internet memory is more easily accessible than the human memory, and the best part of it is that it could be selectively shared a.k.a the privacy settings. So when a space as public and as open as the web gives a selective sharing control to an individual, it's exhilarating for the human mind and heart.
It almost feels like the internet today is an analogy for the Freudian layers of consciousness i.e. the conscious, the pre-conscious and the unconscious. The conscious i.e. feelings, emotions, perceptions at a particular moment that are often shared, is equivalent to our virtual life without any privacy settings, open and accessible to all. In the conscious mask of our virtual life we really want everyone to know how we feel at the moment, want to share a big promotion, or our social etiquette of wishing season greetings to all or sharing the great overseas holiday updates and so on. The pre -conscious is more like the stored past, memories like the great vacation, great party, college days, anniversaries etc. that could be made conscious by one click on the album link. Then comes the devil of them all - the unconscious, the deep seated angst driven emotions, desires, feelings, and the internet definitely has some room for that too. Quietly in the dark with the right kind of proxy servers, and after appropriate and fake kinky names, one could purely indulge in the forbidden and the socially frowned upon activities.
I am a firm believer that internet and its content are designed in consonance to the layers and complexities of human psyche and that's what makes it man's current best friend, beating the canine population.
Interesting analogy. Though I think the unconscious needn't manifest only through a different identity, but also the fact that social networking used to allow one to stalk and access profiles and information behind a curtain of secrecy. I guess Orkut allowed that to a larger degree before a greater control on privacy settings and facebook etc came about.
ReplyDeleteI think this post can be further built to a full blown research enquiry and i also agree with the voyeuristic angle that you pointed out
ReplyDeleteVery interesting, brilliant connections... your post rekindled my interest in transactive memory.
ReplyDeleteLast line gets me thinking - is internet really replacing dogs as man's best friend? Are we moving towards an age where we are better at virtual connections. Another question - Is it better to stay connected with more people than spend more time with less number of people?
and Happy New Year =)
Thanks Mayanka, well the thought came on the first morning of New Year, post a kick ass party.The thought was not call or wish people, but upload pictures of the previous night.... that got me thinking!
ReplyDeleteTrue to the core! I am also convinced of the dismal fate that canines have lost to the computers. Grim as it may sound to me, who knows if the editor of TIME is set to feature Facebook/Twitter as person of the year for circa 2012.
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