If you're new to the Digital Nation website, I encourage you to take a look at the Your Stories link. Here you'll find an ever growing collection of user-generated media, where you can share your stories about life in the digital age and see what other people have to say. I've been developing Your Stories for the past few months, and since the launch of this website, it has been really interesting to watch "Stories" become populated with your videos, opinions and experiences.
What is amazing to me is the bigger picture that is being painted with each new submission. This is your digital nation, and these are your thoughts and experiences, as you choose to share them. In this collage of stories about digital life, not only are we seeing who is using technology (check out submissions with a newborn baby and a grandmother) and how you are using it, but also, how it impacts your life. You're contributing to our exploration of this "virtual frontier" and shedding light on the human experience of life in the digital age.
It is impossible to pick a favorite, but in case you haven't yet been to Stories from Your Digital Nation, here are some contributions to start with:
In My Daily Ritual With Technology, Charles took our challenge, and documented his daily ritual with technology. Watching him get set up at his console made me reflect on myself: I'm always on the go; I have a laptop and cellphone that are constantly at my hip. I check my email when I wake up and before I go to bed (and every 5 minutes in between) and sometimes check my phone even when it's not buzzing. Is this a ritual? I'd never thought about it that way before, but it's hard to imagine a day without either.
Another submission to check out if you're new to the site is The Story of Feed Me Bubbe and Technology. Avrom and his Bubbe talk about using the Internet to create a popular cooking show, and Bubbe, in her 80's discusses the benefits of "making the world smaller" through email... she's even on Twitter!
If you're curious about Second Life, there are some interesting submissions from inside the virtual world. Hannah Bailey shares a teen's perspective, Star Spider shows us the life of an Alternate Reality Gamer (ARG), and Tom Scott looks at what happens to the Twitter messages you thought you deleted.
In the meantime, we'd love to hear from you. Do you have thoughts about one of the videos? Then consider creating your own video submission as a response. After all this is your digital nation, so we need to hear from you. (My submission is coming soon!)
I'll end this post with a recent written submission to Your Stories. Sometimes people have a story they want to share but don't have access to the tools or technology necessary to create a media submission; feel free to send in these stories and we'll post them to the blog or work with you to help create a submission.
I hope you enjoy Stories from Your Digital Nation, and looking forward to hearing your stories too!
Ramona
"A Foray Online: An Unlikely Love Story"
Submitted to Stories from Your Digital Nation 4.21.09
Good afternoon
This email is in response to your invitation to submit stories about how the digital revolution has affected people's lives. Your instructions asked for links to U-tube or Myspace. I have not done that. And that is exactly my point. I don't have a Myspace page. Don't spend my evening on Secondlife. Don't play live on line games. Don't have a Blackberry or any kind of PDA, don't have a webcam or a camcorder. My phone does not take pictures. In fact I generally think the 19th century has more to offer than the 21st, yet digital technology reached up & did things for me I could not have ever imagined.
I am 56 years old. A fat balding white guy who is middle aged only if you know a handful of hundred year olds. Been working at the same middle management job for 23 years now. I attend church pretty regularly, at least for the last few years, and have been an adult scout leader for 12 years. My neighbors would say I am that quiet guy who keeps his grass cut. I am usually reading three books (those big flat things full of sheets of paper if you are young enough never to have seen one) at any one time and most people would say I am pretty dull but not usually to my face. I can see their eyes glaze over when I tell them about the latest history I am reading. This week for your information I am reading an account of Andrew Jackson's years in the White House at work, a biography of Augustus Caesar in the car and John Inving's novel "Till I Find You" at home. I can feel your eyes glazing over as you read this. You don't want to get stuck talking to me at a crawfish boil.
Four years ago, after a 30-year relationship I fond myself somewhat unexpectedly divorced. So what, move on already! I told myself that I would live my life as it amused me and if I met someone living the same life so much the better. Didn't happen. My days were spent at work or with the Scouts, or keeping my grass cut or reading. I read a lot. I ate alone at my favorite restaurants (We have fabulous restaurants in New Orleans).
One evening, while trying to figure out how to send a blast email about the next thrilling weekend campout for the scouts, on my five-year-old iMac... You just knew I had an iMac didn't you? I mean do I sound like a Windows guy? Anyway I got a pop up ad for a free trial on a commercial dating site.
I decided to see. It seemed like as unlikely an idea as I could imagine. I had heard all the horror stories. People, particularly ladies, who began relationships on-line were spoken of in hushed terms in my circles. It would seem that cyber seducers had lured good, god- fearing folk into all sorts of unimaginable transgressions with appropriate catastrophes soon to follow.
I like to tell people that I have one real strength. I know what I want and I am content when I get it. I created a profile that did not mention my 6-pack abs or my racing yachts. I was not cooler online as the C/W song claims. And I wrote honestly about the person I hoped to meet.
Got a ton of responses. It was amazing. I had not planned on that. What in the heck did these ladies want with an old guy like me. Some were fairly easy to sort out. The 23 year old blonde twins from Johannesburg, South Africa did not have honorable intentions.
There was one though that seemed to fit the bill. And in fairly short order I began a series of emails with a lady.
From the start the fit was perfect. It was as if we had known each other for years. The only thing we disagreed on, and there is no suitable blank on the Match.com profile to cover it, was about the occasional Water Moccasin found sunning himself on our front porch. She is terrified of them, claims they are venomous and that they are going kill us or the dogs. They are poisonous, true enough. But really how many people do you meet that have been killed by Water Moccasins. None. She has lived there 15 years and not been killed once. It is just cruel and arbitrary to kill them. Snakes have gotten a bum rap since Genesis. Time for that to be over. If you want I will let you know when we get that issue settled.
About 18 months after that first email, on a beautiful sunny afternoon we stood before the altar in Our Lady of the Lake Catholic church with about 200 friends and were married. It has been 5 months and I am ecstatically happy.
Now it isn't much of a story. I told you I am dull as can be It's happened 2.7 gazillion times. But here is the point. This is the bit that amazes me. Instead of being subjected to the whims of fate, I was able to sit down and say this is what is right for me. And by utilizing all this technology, I could have it.
If you know yourself, If you are willing to be honest about yourself, If you can articulate what you really want then you do not have to wait to for an accident. You can act. You can take control. It's so freakin' cool.
And as for my beloved, being seven years younger, was and is much more tech savy than I will ever claim to be. She is a systems analyist works remote from the house by web and she is slowly working on me. That is of course what women do. They see their husbands as a work in progress. My mother told me once that men restore old cars and women restore old men. May God bless them for it.
Lori is trying not to introduce more change than I can digest at any one time. So now I pay some of my bills on-line, not all. I buy movie tickets on-line if I am afraid it may sell out. There is little or no chance that the indie & foreign films I like will sell out. And I have less cash in my pocket because carry a debit card although I feel odd using it.
If you need to get in touch drop me an email or send a letter. Maybe your grandfather can tell you what that is. You will need both my mailing address and a stamp for that. A stamp is an archaic kind of currency that you have to buy from an archaic government agency.
Mike, Mandeville LA
RSS
Comments