Within the past five years, we've become increasingly wired to our digital lives more than ever. And yet if we can remember, it was only about five years ago that none of us had heard of Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, or even the iPhone. It was a time when mass texting was still exciting and the thing to do--a more prevalent phenomenon to spread the word and send some holiday greetings to our networks. Flip phones were still considered cool, and blackberries meant that you held a so called "important position" of some sort that the need to stay connected at all times was a necessity. These days, the blackberry is arguably struggling to keep up next to the iPhone; there is something called the droid that's curiously not meeting its full potential; and just about everyone and their mother is working on shaping their presence on line--so much so that our Internet connections have become an extension of our daily interactions, and consequently our daily relationships.
Below is a mini-student documentary by Kate Ray on the idea that the culture of "Web 3.0" might have possible side-effects of containing too much information traffic in our brains-- in turn conceivably causing paralysis to a society who's progressively becoming addicted to an over-consumption of data. As a result, the process may ultimately follow the inevitable information indigestion. The television lifestyle, was all about passivity--sitting back and watching, while the Web lifestyle is mostly about consumption--searching, finding; but how we digest such a wealth of knowledge--to sift through what is relevant and to decipher what is not, as a society certainly remains to be unseen...
Have a watch and share your thoughts at the NewsGallery. (Bare in mind, it is student work). Nonetheless: brava to Ms. Ray for gathering an impressive group of Web pioneers in your mini-doc to offer some insight--if not at the very least a "Status Update"on the untamed beast we now call Semantic Web 3.0.
Web 3.0, by Kate Ray
Kate Ray is a Journalism/Psychology student at NYU. She writes about Semantic Web on her blog HERE.
