hopes and confessions

      Alright, lets hope that at some point I won't be talking to myself. I'd like to start with a wish, I realize that with a name of a blog like the one I chose it might be a little hard to live up to the name. The topics are things that I am very interested in, and I'm not really sure what this will be about. I imagine it will be just me ranting on about this and that. So I honestly hope that I won't disappoint.

      Let me also say that I am a a recovering technoholic. I am one of those people, that hate what cell phones have done, I hate myspace, I hate facebook, I hate twitter, I hate television, I hate addictive blackberrys and iphones. I am an advocate for face to face communication, for going to the park and accidentally running in to someone and a friendship forming, spontaneity, and people very simply just talking to each other. The little things that you see when you are facing someone are incredible, the facial expressions, the body language, the tone of voice, eye contact. All of that disappears on the internet and through mobile communication. I was at the blueman group and I was shocked by a this little line that they had during their show. it said : Welcome to the internet cafe, come and sit next to people you don't know, and talk to people who are not there. I don't think that I will ever forget this line for the rest of my life. 

      However, just like when a person goes to an AA meeting, they sit around a table and introduce themselves. They say: Hello my name is Zack and I am an alcoholic. Hello, my name is Rostislav and I am a Technoholic. I send out almost as many text messages as a 14 year old girl with a sidekick. And I now own a blackberry. I have an RSS feed on it, the internet, text messaging and unlimited emails. Goffman once talked about public interaction and shields. A shield is something that one hides himself with in public, like a newspaper or a book. Well my cellphone is my shield. I'm not one to be afraid of any form of public interaction, but I look at my cellphone constantly, even if there's nothing on it. I'll read worldchanging, or BBC, possibly treehugger, or joke of the day. But I hate it, I wish that I could stop but I have become so dependent on my email, on knowing what to do. One thing though, I am proud to say that I don't watch television. There is nothing better than sitting down with a good book and reading to your hearts content. I read an article recently on  a study performed on Wifi in public spaces in two cities. The results of the study classified people who utilize wifi in cafe's into two different categories, Placemakers and Truemobiles. Truemobiles were people who came into wifi cafes with their laptops, for work as an escape. They tried to escape any form of public interaction and hid behind their laptops for most of the time. Mostly the only interaction that they had was if an acquaintance showed up. Placemakers were people who came with their laptops, but spent most of the time looking around and trying to make some form of public interaction. Their main goal was for interaction with people there. The laptop was just one of the tools for them, and a temporary distraction so that they don't just sit there. In terms of those two categories, even though I don't usually sit in cafes with my laptop, but with my cellphone I imagine I would be a placemaker. 

      So thats it. I want everyone to know that I have high expectations for this blog, and I do hope that at some point I won't be talking to myself. adios