This may come across as a strange article ... as I am a writer for a web hosting company who likes for me to spread the word about how cool the Internet is, so average people, if they ever ge
This may come across as a strange article contextually as I am a writer for a web hosting company who likes for me to spread the word about how cool the Internet is, so average people, if they ever get to read this stuff, may be inspired to partake in this new aspect of our collective, privileged, contemporary society. I have been an avid music listener and player for many years of my life and I want to give you the simple story of how the Internet has now connected once again with my life’s journey. I have a deep-seated dream of one day producing some music while I’m here in the world, but as in many cases, we humans have fears in relation to the ideas and feelings that mean the most to us. Recently I first heard music from a guy called Jeff Buckley.
This Jeff Buckley fellow can really play, I mean he could really play. His music spoke to me instantly; he plays guitar and sings in a way that touches and even haunts the soul. For a person like myself who hopes to one day become a ‘real’ musician and not just a hobbyist, this guy is a true inspiration. Buckley died at the age of 31 years. So how did I find out about the guy? The Internet. I even read the lyrics off a website to the song I was listening to at that very moment. Looking at photos, reading his biography; the experience of hearing the music at the same time as ‘seeing’ and learning about Buckley added a whole new dimension to the experience. The Internet let me feel the music in a new way, and resulted in a moment of epiphany-and don’t these moments mean so much to us?
So what am I alluding to? What am I getting at here? The idea I think I’m trying to articulate is that the Internet can add dimensions to our experiences. Of course there is nothing wrong with listening to music on its own, simplicity is one of the most beautiful ways to live life. But for me in this particular instance, adding visuals, lyrics, and information about the musician seemed to make the feelings I received via the music grow and swell in the moment. The experience became multidimensional, both a reflection and a new vision simultaneously felt.
The result for me was like a big kick in the ass. If you want to make music, stop procrastinating. This guy Jeff Buckley gave it his best, made beautiful music and then died. He didn’t get to hang around very long, and the same thing can happen to any of us. If I don’t follow my dream now, in the present, I might just leave this place before I use the opportunities that have been given to me.
All I’m trying to say here is that the Internet is becoming a tool that we can use in our daily lives that can add richness and texture to our lives. Like all internal and external stimulus in our world, it too just might be the medium that ignites the ‘light bulb’ idea that changes the rest of your life.
Knowledge From the People, For the People
I’ve heard about it a lot but until today I had never checked it out, Wikipedia the free on-line encyclopedia. (http://en.wikipedia.org) Now this is a pretty cool invention, let me tell you. This is an encyclopedia made by the masses for the masses, and anyone (even you) can add or edit pages. This means that if you’ve got a piece of knowledge that you think is worth knowing, after checking that it is not out there already you can add to this huge body of knowledge that is growing everyday. There are over half a million articles in English alone, but there are also articles from many other different languages, some with over 100,000. In the old days we had to spend a lot of money to buy encyclopedias. They took up a lot of space and were produced by private corporations hoping to make a monetary gain. Now we can write the book and read it for free!Prophetic Nerds
I am an Internet creative writer and journalist and yet knowledge of the technical side of computers still eludes me. As I work with tech-heads I've always had a feeling that they were a different breed of people, with their strange language of numbers and abbreviated terminology. I've also had the egotistical belief that because they are always sitting at their computers, that somehow they were missing out on life, as opposed to people like me who try to spend as much time in fresh air as possible. Well, I had a wake up call today when I asked a few of my colleagues about the changing world of communication, television, film, and advertising that has begun to evolve at an alarming rate since the advent of the Internet.Limiting Perceptions and Broadening Horizons
A balance of "tunnel vision" and broad perspective are needed for human society to flourish.