O thou, my lovely boy, who in thy power
Dost hold Time’s fickle glass, his sickle, hour…

Sonnet 126

 

 

 

The so-called “social” media, currently our lovely boy of  communication, hold in their darting packets of data, surely, unimaginable power.

• They collapse distance across continents and seas we once showed on no maps. Ariel, himself, would weep.
• They erase the time — days, weeks, months, even years — we once waited for letters.
• They spin across the planet’s surface to survey, sift, locate, tag, follow, and bond us to people we’d never have met in earlier times. Our ability to convene global salons of cohorts in real time is unprecedented in human experience.
• They pump ready reservoirs of information into deserts of ignorance and await only curiosity to be tapped.
• They open to us possibilities of collusion and cooperation, contrivance and collaboration, calumny and camaraderie, catastrophe and compassion.

So where do we get off being so trite when we speak of these forces? [Read more…]