Comment Re:Technological Children Much? (Score 3, Interesting) 211
I have always wondered how anyone remembers what to remember. What subconscious sets of anxieties and biases determine what stories we tell about ourselves years later?
I'm reminded of a story in the New York Times magazine several years ago, recounting some of the content from a release of KGB surveillance records. Every moment of Soviet suspect citizen's lives were documented, with one passage recounting how a particular citizen approached a hot dog stand, asked for a hot dog, waited as the hot dog was prepared, paid for the hot dog, placed mustard on the hot dog, asked for relish, said thank you, walked away from the hot dog stand... I would think it mildly interesting to learn that my life had been documented in such a way.
I used to have webcams all over my place. Three of them at home, two at the office, taking photos every 5 or 10 seconds. I did it for years, and forgot about it until I found 50,000+ webcam pictures of me; photos of me sitting here, or sitting there, walking around. It seemed depressing at first, endless pictures of me gaping into a computer monitor and talking on the phone. Wasting this life is the impression I got when my own memories of that time have faded and only raw visual information about my activities was available. It's amazing how little that visual and other documentary information convey about the mental and psychological experience of a memory.
I can't say that my impression of discovering those thousands of pictures has changed, either. Life looks pretty damn boring when all quotidian endeavors are documented like precious information, but under certain influences I find it inspiring, too. It's the stuff of comedy, after all.
I think this sort of thing will never be mainstream, but I think it could become more common. I would liked to have a video camera in my eyes, sending video out to a web server somewhere, when I got mugged last year or when I witnessed a hit-and-run accident a few months ago. Anxiety and other circumstances effectively prevent me from clearly remembering what happened.
Then again, I think most memories should fade.
I'm reminded of a story in the New York Times magazine several years ago, recounting some of the content from a release of KGB surveillance records. Every moment of Soviet suspect citizen's lives were documented, with one passage recounting how a particular citizen approached a hot dog stand, asked for a hot dog, waited as the hot dog was prepared, paid for the hot dog, placed mustard on the hot dog, asked for relish, said thank you, walked away from the hot dog stand... I would think it mildly interesting to learn that my life had been documented in such a way.
I used to have webcams all over my place. Three of them at home, two at the office, taking photos every 5 or 10 seconds. I did it for years, and forgot about it until I found 50,000+ webcam pictures of me; photos of me sitting here, or sitting there, walking around. It seemed depressing at first, endless pictures of me gaping into a computer monitor and talking on the phone. Wasting this life is the impression I got when my own memories of that time have faded and only raw visual information about my activities was available. It's amazing how little that visual and other documentary information convey about the mental and psychological experience of a memory.
I can't say that my impression of discovering those thousands of pictures has changed, either. Life looks pretty damn boring when all quotidian endeavors are documented like precious information, but under certain influences I find it inspiring, too. It's the stuff of comedy, after all.
I think this sort of thing will never be mainstream, but I think it could become more common. I would liked to have a video camera in my eyes, sending video out to a web server somewhere, when I got mugged last year or when I witnessed a hit-and-run accident a few months ago. Anxiety and other circumstances effectively prevent me from clearly remembering what happened.
Then again, I think most memories should fade.
