Having accounts for all four of the above-mentioned sites, in addition to countless others, has plopped me right into this very bubble that Schwartz alludes to. But while Schwartz and Tony Igor have adapted to email at its introduction, our generation was nearly born into it. While they reminisce about their pre-email days, we have a hard time remembering let alone imagining, what life would be like without this now vital tool. Unfortunately, I foresee that, following the exponential upward curve of technological advances, this net-bubble will continue to grow and expand. But however unlikely it may seem, is POP (Post Office Protocol) ultimately doomed to pop?
Friday, January 22, 2010
The POP Bubble
I believe that even Tony Schwartz would be surprised to see how wide the net-bubble has expanded since "Going Postal" was published in 1999. Although e-mail is definitely near the top of time-hogging internet activity, social networking sites, such as twitter, facebook, youtube, and blogger are just, if not more, addictive. The combination of all these sites have led people to sprout virtual lives in which they can chose to be whoever they please.
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I agree with the idea that e-mail is something that has always been present in our lives, and it would be very difficult to imagine life without it. It has formed the way (and speed) in which activities are accomplished. However, I do not think that the post office has become somewhat obsolete. Humans still have the need to be able to deal with the concrete, be it a letter in the mail as oppose to an email. The letter seems more official. An example of this is that most public documents, bills, statements etc are still printed out and mailed to an individual as oppose to e-mailed.
ReplyDeleteVery nicely tied in with the reading! Kudos for that!
ReplyDeleteAre you justifying the use of email by saying other online resources (i.e. Twitter) are more time consuming, or are you saying they are all too time consuming and deserve more careful use? Something to think about.
It's interesting that you take the position that the 'net-bubble' is negative. I would encourage you to consider your life without email, a topic I would have like some insight on.
Very good usage of vocabulary, and clever usage of the varying meanings of 'pop/POP' at the end!
You make a few vary valid points that I didn't consider at all in my response. For one, I didn't stop to think about the date of the article and that technology has gone even further since it was written. And in a related point, I made the argument in my response that I could certainly live without e-mail, but I didn't think about social networking sites. I'm a huge Facebook addict and I guess maybe if I didn't have that, or Myspace or something like these, maybe I would be more obsessive about e-mail. Way to make a strong, in-depth argument.
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