Follow the Yellow Brick Road

I was interested in Computers from the time I was a little boy in the 1950s.  So I watched the world go from mainframes up through microprocessors to Trs-80s to Apple to Macintosh to Macs. I watched simultaneously the IBM PC become a clone and reasonable enough in price for anyone to buy, first in the U.S. and then Europe and all around the world. I watched as games were made for computers, and Ataris, and then Sonys, and then Ouis etc. I watched the Internet start with the military and then move to university networks and finally yahoo appeared to be the first search engine easily available to the public. then all of a sudden there were many search engines. And then there was Wikipedia, MySpace and Facebook and all the other social networks and information sites. Simaltaneously, cell phones got smaller and smaller until I began to see I wanted and needed one too. I think around 2000 my wife and I got our first cellphones and we each have had one ever since along with all our children.

So, I guess what I'm saying is I watched all this happen from the 1950s when I was a child until now. So I have a much different take on all this than many others born in the 1970s, 1980s, 1990s or even since 2000.

I see just how much has been gained. But I also see just how much has been lost in privacy, and sanity by most everyone. Before cellphones one could be sure No one could contact them while they were traveling from point A to point B wherever and whenever that was. There were no phone calls from scared parents, relatives, neurotic girlfriends or crazy friends to field. There was just quiet, boredom, looking at nature, sea, mountains, listening to the music, talking to friends traveling with you, (quiet) if you wished. Sanity if you wished. Nothing at all to bother you while you thought about something really important or even really trivial. If you weren't near a land line phone that they had a number to no one could ever bother you because they had no way to contact you (usually). And this was nice unless you were in a blizzard, an accident or seriously needed help.

So, what you lost was peace, privacy, sanity, people leaving you alone, and what you got was safety, insanity, people bothering you at the worst possible times, and never having time to have a single thought to yourselves to the point where young people don't even value having time to think for themselves at all and are always addicted to some kind of media. And I have personally seen teenagers and younger start crying when there is no wifi or ethernet available for their laptops. I might be unhappy myself but after all I lived until I was 6 years old even without a black and white TV in 1954. I had to listen to "Gildersleave" and "Fibber McGee and Molly" with my grandmother on the radio just before bed until I was 6. And even then my father only bought a TV so I wouldn't stay so late next door at my 6 year old friends house watching TV all the time.

What do you get when you have a whole generation addicted to media? People who can't think for themselves. People who aren't worth anything in an emergency. People who are completely different than their ancestors. People who value being thought well of over their personal survival and the survival of their friends and loved ones.

So, as we all follow the yellow brick road of infinite media where does it lead to? How many young men and now young women will never find a mate or ever marry or have kids because instead of going out and finding someone worth being with they are addicted to multiple media instead?

And now, it's supposed to be okay that there is unecrypted programming in our phones that show literally everywhere we ever go including to our banks, Doctors, beach, mountains, motels, everything and you don't think that is a problem. I think you will all think that is a problem when someone steals your laptop computer that was synched with your Iphone and someone tracks you down and puts a gun in your mouth or your friends or mother's or fathers mouth because they have everywhere you go everyday mapped out on your laptop that they stole. I personally think this is a really big problem for anyone with an Iphone smartphone or with an Android smartphone because they both have similar issues. So, as people start getting mugged and killed because of all this watch apple and Google try to repress these stories one by one. Because it has either happened already or it will soon. That's 100% fact.