the YouTube generation
$Zero
as expected, it's begun.
the question is, will it have a mostly positive or a mostly negative
impact on humanity?
i'd say that, as usual, it all depends on how we use it.
unfortunately, given the whole of human history so far, that makes for
some pretty bad odds.
but i remain optimistic.
-$Zero...
boots
What's "YouTube"?
--
Subtlety written subtly can be subtly edited away.
Towse
> the YouTube generation
You'd name a =generation= after an online service that started less than
two years ago and quickly sold out and descended into the maw of Google?
Why?
--
Sal
Ye olde swarm of links: thousands of links for writers, researchers and
the terminally curious <http://www.internet-resources.com/writers>
$Zero
> $Zero wrote:
>
> > the YouTube generation
>
> You'd name a =generation= after an online service that started less than
> two years ago and quickly sold out and descended into the maw of Google?
>
> Why?
because it's fitting.
-$Zero...
Towse
Two years from now, will there be a YouTube?
Why name a group of kids born in a twenty-year span after a commercial
application no matter how popular?
Would you name them the MP3 generation or the NetFlix generation? GenX
wasn't the MTV generation, after all.
$Zero
> $Zero wrote:
> > Towse wrote:
> >> $Zero wrote:
> >>
> >>> the YouTube generation
> >> You'd name a =generation= after an online service that started less than
> >> two years ago and quickly sold out and descended into the maw of Google?
> >>
> >> Why?
> >
> > because it's fitting.
>
> Two years from now, will there be a YouTube?
i'd wager yes.
> Why name a group of kids born in a twenty-year span after a commercial
> application no matter how popular?
well, for one, "generation" is not limited to "kids born in a
twenty-year span.
and YouTube is definitely the most popular.
it surpassed myspace in traffic.
> Would you name them the MP3 generation or the NetFlix generation? GenX
> wasn't the MTV generation, after all.
well, calling it:
The YouTube Generation
is far more poetic than calling it:
The Streaming-Video Bloggers Generation.
no?
-$Zero...
$Zero
> Towse wrote:
> > $Zero wrote:
> > > Towse wrote:
> > >> $Zero wrote:
> > >>
> > >>> the YouTube generation
> > >> You'd name a =generation= after an online service that started less than
> > >> two years ago and quickly sold out and descended into the maw of Google?
> > >>
> > >> Why?
> > >
> > > because it's fitting.
> >
> > Two years from now, will there be a YouTube?
>
> i'd wager yes.
>
>
> > Why name a group of kids born in a twenty-year span after a commercial
> > application no matter how popular?
>
> well, for one, "generation" is not limited to "kids born in a
> twenty-year span".
>
> and YouTube is definitely the most popular.
>
> it surpassed myspace in traffic.
>
> > Would you name them the MP3 generation or the NetFlix generation?
no.
but i wouldn't hesitate to call them the iPod Generation.
> > GenX wasn't the MTV generation, after all.
i'd say that the MTV generation flies as a characterization.
although it goes beyond the set of people who qualify as GenX.
> well, calling it:
>
> The YouTube Generation
>
> is far more poetic than calling it:
>
> The Streaming-Video Bloggers Generation.
not to mention the traditional education dynamics that are sure to
evolve during The YouTube Generation.
video-taped lectures on the web.
all nicely indexed and available at will.
regardless of whether it's YouTube or Google Video or any other
streaming video provider.
it's still appropos to call it the YouTube generation, imo.
it's a nice catchy poetic name.
kinda like Xerox or Kleenix, only a bit more naturally descripitive.
> no?
-$Zero...
Selur
So, we're distilling a generation's behaviors in this thread? All
"between the ages of" into a homogenous group?
And what about crass, self-centered, Lexus-wielding "YUPPIES" of the
'80s?
They need a new acronym...
"Boomers (hippies) made dreadful teachers in the late 60s and 70s.
Lots of them went into teaching right after college for some reason. I
think they did it not for a love of teaching but ideas of political
indoctination into the left.
Teaching and indoctrinating children came right before becoming morally
and materially self-absorbed and adopting the generation's new name:
(yuppies).
The time I am referring to was when they were high on being
intellectually self-absorbed and were still sort of "hippies". They
proclaimed anti-establishment. <snicker>. The "new peasant" look,
sandles, necklaces, neru and loads of attitude. We thought, at first,
with "the look" they might be "cool." Then we learned. We learned that
these were rigid shrill creatures. To keep quiet around them, don't
raise your hand unless you want to affirm. There's a picture of Gloria
Steinman glowering smugly on the cinderblock wall. An icon reminding
you to save your interogatories and thoughts for the other classrooms,
the ones with the teacher who wears a suit and tie and occasionally
mentions Iwo Jima as a place he'd been to. He deals in facts. Or,
Mrs. so and so's, classroom. She was steady and inflexible as a rock,
someone you knew you could count on. It was safe to discuss ideas
there.
One dreadfully wasted fall we had an entire unit dedicated to
transcendental meditation, or "TM" as it was abbreviated to in my
school. We took it all in; that forward-thinking alternative
curriculum. We were children, so everyone knew we didn't know anything
when we said it was a waste of time. To combat this rebellious
negativity, a portion of the the time already allocated for
transcendental meditation unit had to be diverted into "how important
transcendental meditation is as compared to anything else you might
doing." Though duly instructed, I still wondered how I will apply it
and when, exactly.
About that new name...
Selur
Echosyn
How about Generation Z? I concur with you. Check out Blavatsky's
babboon, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, and his legagy to the world during his
latter years with the help of Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands
(Meru). Back to UTube, frontline cutting edge mindmolding of our youth
is directed from Adyar, India. Just off shore from there the tsunami
uncovered the home of Rama Krishna. The Mad Madame knew it was there,
so there she made her camp and played the harlot with Lucifer. Now the
children march into the sea of oblivion and drag the world with them.
-Echosyn
boots
Children have been getting indoctrinated since the dawn of time.
There are always the rigid, the smug, the intellectually superior, the
realists, the loons, always bludgeoning in their own ways. Children
always resist, submit, change, harden, as is their individual nature.
To name a generation? Boomers, Gen-X, whatever; they are not all the
same, we are not all the same. We are simply different pieces of meat
being fed through the grinder. If you really want a name for the
current generation you might call them "kids". You might call them
"the armageddon generation". You will be no less right than any of
the others who have puffed their chests for making up a name that
caught on, no more wrong than any who snivelled because only they
liked the name they shouldn't have bothered to make up in the first
place. The guy who invented the pet rock made a few bucks. He got at
least a finger over the edge of the grinder and had some hope of
pulling himself out while there was something left to save.
$Zero
well, that's what some of you are doing.
i meant "generation" in the sense of all of those alive during a
particular set of circumstances, no matter what their age.
The YouTube Generation i was refering to is anything but a homogenous
group, except to the extent that they may have access to the tools of,
or exposure to the effects of, YouTube-type phenomenons.
the ability to easily communicate, or be easily communicated to,
audio-visually in a searchable database-like keyword-based way.
the potential is enormous.
the INDIVIDUAL is now able to express themselves, or educate
themselves, using their natural audio-visual natures as a
toolbox/canvas/comprehension aid.
like, for instance, one can learn about facial expressions:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4208768066007592948
or string clips together:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1835349842451576492
or one of my persional favorites, be sublimely sarcastic:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1LWg1jFp4E&eurl
-$Zero...
Towse
>
>The guy who invented the pet rock made a few bucks. He got at
> least a finger over the edge of the grinder and had some hope of
> pulling himself out while there was something left to save.
>
Gary Dahl. Five months. Craze lasted August-Christmas 1975 and was good
while it lasted. 5 million pet rocks, or thereabouts. $3.95/rock. $1/ea
profit for Dahl.
Dahl used part of his lucre to buy the Park Lounge on North Santa Cruz
Avenue in Los Gatos, CA, which he subsequently shut down, remodeled and
reopened as Carry Nation's.
Dahl won Grand Prize in the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest in 2000 with,
"The heather-encrusted Headlands, veiled in fog as thick as smoke in a
crowded pub, hunched precariously over the moors, their rocky elbows
slipping off land's end, their bulbous, craggy noses thrust into the
thick foam of the North Sea like bearded old men falling asleep in their
pints."
He also wrote Advertising for Dummies for the For Dummies series.
boots
>boots wrote:
>>
>>The guy who invented the pet rock made a few bucks. He got at
>> least a finger over the edge of the grinder and had some hope of
>> pulling himself out while there was something left to save.
>>
>
>Gary Dahl. Five months. Craze lasted August-Christmas 1975 and was good
>while it lasted. 5 million pet rocks, or thereabouts. $3.95/rock. $1/ea
>profit for Dahl.
>
>Dahl used part of his lucre to buy the Park Lounge on North Santa Cruz
>Avenue in Los Gatos, CA, which he subsequently shut down, remodeled and
>reopened as Carry Nation's.
>
>Dahl won Grand Prize in the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest in 2000 with,
>"The heather-encrusted Headlands, veiled in fog as thick as smoke in a
>crowded pub, hunched precariously over the moors, their rocky elbows
>slipping off land's end, their bulbous, craggy noses thrust into the
>thick foam of the North Sea like bearded old men falling asleep in their
>pints."
>
>He also wrote Advertising for Dummies for the For Dummies series.
Do you think he pulled himself out of the meatgrinder in time? Sounds
to me like he's still in it, but then I think his prize-winning prose
sucks major ass so wtf do I know.
Towse
His prize-winning prose is =supposed= to suck major ass. That's the
point of the contest. Dahl milked it for all it's worth:
<http://www.bulwer-lytton.com/#The%20rules>
Dahl was an ad guy, drinking with friends at the Grog and Sirloin in Los
Gatos, when he came up with the Pet Rock idea. He was =always= in it for
the money, only in it for the money.
He put together the training manual and the packaging and started
flogging. Through it all he was always the ad guy, creating a tease,
putting out PR, fanning the flames.
He wasn't =in= the meat grinder, he was the guy grinding up meat in the
meat grinder and selling it as Kobe burgers. (What's up with Kobe
burgers? Kobe beef is supposed to be worth all that jazz because it's
been hand massaged or something and carefully raised and is =sooooo=
tender it melts in your mouth like foie gras on a hot griddle. And then
you grind it up and serve it as burgers? Once ground, what's the diff
between ground Kobe beef and something butchered and ground from Alum
Rock Foods?)
Dahl =was= the meat grinder. Was. Still is.
He has a PR firm these days.
How do you define "escaping the meat grinder" of life in today's society?
How would you know someone had escaped? Could you tell by how they are
living or what they are doing or whether they shop or don't shop or
whether they even have to shop?
If you live you life trying to prove to yourself that you've escaped the
meat grinder aren't you de facto giving the meat grinder power over your
life and everything you do?
boots
>How do you define "escaping the meat grinder" of life in today's society?
Good question. I'm not sure if I can immediately offer a good answer
or not.
>How would you know someone had escaped? Could you tell by how they are
>living or what they are doing or whether they shop or don't shop or
>whether they even have to shop?
They would have a list of have-to's that went something like:
* wake up
* take a dump
* eat food
* sleep
They would do a lot more than that clearly, but they wouldn't have to.
>If you live you life trying to prove to yourself that you've escaped the
>meat grinder aren't you de facto giving the meat grinder power over your
>life and everything you do?
Maybe, if proving you had escaped was something you had to do.
You don't have to leave society in order to leave the ratrace, mostly
you have to not play that game. How to do that, while you continue to
eat and sleep-in-a-warm-place? Ask the Buddha, I guess. Stay really
really stoned? Inherit more wealth than you need? Not mind living in
a homeless shelter? It's a tough game with lots of possible
solutions.
I'm too busy working on my version this morning to really talk well
about it in the abstract. Feel free to poke-poke and continue the
discussion, or not, as you wish.
Towse
> Towse <se...@towse.com> wrote:
>
>> How do you define "escaping the meat grinder" of life in today's society?
>
> Good question. I'm not sure if I can immediately offer a good answer
> or not.
>
>> How would you know someone had escaped? Could you tell by how they are
>> living or what they are doing or whether they shop or don't shop or
>> whether they even have to shop?
>
> They would have a list of have-to's that went something like:
>
> * wake up
> * take a dump
> * eat food
> * sleep
>
> They would do a lot more than that clearly, but they wouldn't have to.
"have to"
Didn't you do the EST thing back when? You're of the age. "have to" is a
choice.
I went to the Ruth Asawa exhibit at the DeYoung a few days back.
Interesting person. Her philosophy, such as it was, was to never to do
anything just for money.
She lived without much means. Raised six children while doing her art,
made art, taught art, sold art. Her life played out with no division
between work and play and taking care of life and raising her children.
The soup she made was as much a work of art as her metal sculptures, to
her. Her husband worked and brought in a paycheck but he seems to have
consider that not being put through the meat grinder by corporate
lackeys but as a means of using his talents to contribute to the family
and its creative. They did not have new cars. No TV. No new clothes.
They had art supplies. Tools. Home grown food. Friends. Community.
Activism. Creativity.
Your life and what you do needs to be meaningful, whether that means
blissing out over the zen of weeding the yard or blissing out over a
perfectly executed ad campaign.
Joy.
In living.
>> If you live you life trying to prove to yourself that you've escaped the
>> meat grinder aren't you de facto giving the meat grinder power over your
>> life and everything you do?
>
> Maybe, if proving you had escaped was something you had to do.
>
> You don't have to leave society in order to leave the ratrace, mostly
> you have to not play that game.
What game might that be?
And why =must= you play it at all?
You're off at your cabin and not reading the Merc anymore. There's no
=you must= or you wouldn't've been able to walk away.
How hard was walking away? For plenty of people it would be too hard,
too hard, too hard. "I hate my life but I must live with this crap" crap.
I knew people who had their house foreclosed back before it became
fashionable not because they couldn't cut back and adjust and save it
but because they couldn't bear to give up the place in the mountains or
was it the beach or South of the Border. That's a choice they made.
Choices. Some people have choices, others have fewer. Most have a
couple. For those who have choices, they're making the choice every day
to be where they are.
One of the choices everyone has is your attitude toward what's going on
around you. You must know people who roll with the punches and ones who
-- well -- don't.
If it isn't all attitude, how come you can be happy as ever can be and
then down in the dumps because you found out your momma was dissing you
over in alt.books-boots? What was different between then and now except
for a change in your attitude? (And don't give me that but she =made= me
change my attitude. She dissed me!)
> How to do that, while you continue to
> eat and sleep-in-a-warm-place? Ask the Buddha, I guess. Stay really
> really stoned? Inherit more wealth than you need? Not mind living in
> a homeless shelter? It's a tough game with lots of possible
> solutions.
Some people enjoy their work and for them it's not a rat race or a meat
grinder or even a cold, grey corporate vise. They joyfully go to work
every day and love what they're doing and keep on working even though
they don't need to be working to stay out of the shelters or have enough
to eat.
After Case was diagnosed with terminal cancer, he kept on working
through chemo and all of that and kept on working up until ten days
before he died. If I got a similar diagnosis I would go to Bhutan again
for as long as they'd have me. I'd visit the Taj Majal, watch the
sunrise on a tropical isle, see the jungle when it's wet with rain, ...
but Case loved his work, he loved what he was doing. Don't tell me he
was in a meat grinder or caught in the rat race.
Not everyone is. You were. You escaped. Don't assume that all those left
behind are in the trap you were caught in.
Find your bliss.
> I'm too busy working on my version this morning to really talk well
> about it in the abstract. Feel free to poke-poke and continue the
> discussion, or not, as you wish.
Talk with Zero about brainwash.
Alan Hope
>Some people enjoy their work and for them it's not a rat race or a meat
>grinder or even a cold, grey corporate vise. They joyfully go to work
>every day and love what they're doing and keep on working even though
>they don't need to be working to stay out of the shelters or have enough
>to eat.
I wrote a reply to this, essentially backing up Sal's point. But I'm
afraid my points were all to smug, and offered nothing to anyone who
doesn't share my fortunate situation.
My work-family balance is about as good as it could get, I was going
to say. When it struck me that this is not what most people want to
hear, though, I deleted the post.
I'm glad I did. I don't need to add my own self-congratulations to the
thread.
boots
>boots wrote:
<snip>
>> They would do a lot more than that clearly, but they wouldn't have to.
>
>"have to"
>
>Didn't you do the EST thing back when? You're of the age.
I'm only almost of the age, Sal. When EST first reared its head I was
a college student, by the time I was making an actual income EST had
become the butt of too many jokes to be something one would consider
seriously, so no, it isn't something I did.
>"have to" is a choice.
I understand that. Remember in "Office Space" when the guy says "I
don't like paying bills. I don't think I'll do that anymore."? Yes,
it's a choice, and all choices come with strings. Gautama had the
balls to say "I'll sit under this tree until I understand, and if I
starve first so be it" and stick to his guns. Most people either
don't bother at all, or sit down and make the claim but stop when it's
lunchtime.
>I went to the Ruth Asawa exhibit at the DeYoung a few days back.
>Interesting person. Her philosophy, such as it was, was to never to do
>anything just for money.
>
>She lived without much means. Raised six children while doing her art,
>made art, taught art, sold art. Her life played out with no division
>between work and play and taking care of life and raising her children.
The no-division thing is important, it takes two armies to battle, and
if you have two armies there's really nothing else for them to do.
>The soup she made was as much a work of art as her metal sculptures, to
>her. Her husband worked and brought in a paycheck but he seems to have
>consider that not being put through the meat grinder by corporate
>lackeys but as a means of using his talents to contribute to the family
>and its creative. They did not have new cars. No TV. No new clothes.
>They had art supplies. Tools. Home grown food. Friends. Community.
>Activism. Creativity.
It's easy to hang out if somebody is paying the bills for you.
>Your life and what you do needs to be meaningful, whether that means
>blissing out over the zen of weeding the yard or blissing out over a
>perfectly executed ad campaign.
>
>Joy.
>
>In living.
>
>>> If you live you life trying to prove to yourself that you've escaped the
>>> meat grinder aren't you de facto giving the meat grinder power over your
>>> life and everything you do?
>>
>> Maybe, if proving you had escaped was something you had to do.
>>
>> You don't have to leave society in order to leave the ratrace, mostly
>> you have to not play that game.
>
>What game might that be?
Submitting for money. Once you get past that game there's "offering
for trade" and then "accepting", it's a progression. Is there a
gameless place? There seems to be, but if you reach it I suspect that
you disappear in a puff of smoke. I may be answering in a context
other than the one in which you are asking.
>And why =must= you play it at all?
An independent life without any money at all is pretty much impossible
within the laws of the land, and "suicide is painless" is only a song
lyric.
>You're off at your cabin and not reading the Merc anymore. There's no
>=you must= or you wouldn't've been able to walk away.
Sure there were have-to's. I had to spend a shitload of money on a
private school to get my youngest a high-school diploma because
there's no other way it would ever have happened. I had to keep
driving the commute traffic at 10mph in the snow because otherwise the
paychecks would have stopped and I'd have had enough unpaid bills to
choke a horse. There were lots of have-to's that kept me in the game
for as long as I could play it.
>How hard was walking away? For plenty of people it would be too hard,
>too hard, too hard. "I hate my life but I must live with this crap" crap.
I stayed in that place for as long as I could survive it Sal. Then it
was no longer a choice. I was out of that game in every way except
the physical. The world recognized that and nudged me away, for which
I am thankful.
>I knew people who had their house foreclosed back before it became
>fashionable not because they couldn't cut back and adjust and save it
>but because they couldn't bear to give up the place in the mountains or
>was it the beach or South of the Border. That's a choice they made.
>
>Choices. Some people have choices, others have fewer. Most have a
>couple. For those who have choices, they're making the choice every day
>to be where they are.
>
>One of the choices everyone has is your attitude toward what's going on
>around you. You must know people who roll with the punches and ones who
>-- well -- don't.
>
>If it isn't all attitude, how come you can be happy as ever can be and
>then down in the dumps because you found out your momma was dissing you
>over in alt.books-boots?
Sorry but you lost me there.
> What was different between then and now except
>for a change in your attitude? (And don't give me that but she =made= me
>change my attitude. She dissed me!)
>
>> How to do that, while you continue to
>> eat and sleep-in-a-warm-place? Ask the Buddha, I guess. Stay really
>> really stoned? Inherit more wealth than you need? Not mind living in
>> a homeless shelter? It's a tough game with lots of possible
>> solutions.
>
>Some people enjoy their work and for them it's not a rat race or a meat
>grinder or even a cold, grey corporate vise. They joyfully go to work
>every day and love what they're doing and keep on working even though
>they don't need to be working to stay out of the shelters or have enough
>to eat.
I enjoyed my work for decades. I still enjoy my work. The difference
is that I came to find the only environment that was available for me
to work in to be inhospitable and finally unacceptable. Now I enjoy
my work and find the pay nonexistent. I get by on the belief that
someday there will be an income. If not, at least it's a nice tree to
be found under.
>After Case was diagnosed with terminal cancer, he kept on working
>through chemo and all of that and kept on working up until ten days
>before he died. If I got a similar diagnosis I would go to Bhutan again
>for as long as they'd have me. I'd visit the Taj Majal, watch the
>sunrise on a tropical isle, see the jungle when it's wet with rain, ...
>but Case loved his work, he loved what he was doing. Don't tell me he
>was in a meat grinder or caught in the rat race.
He did what he did. For some people a prison is a prison, for others
it is free room and board with a library. For some people the
corporate environment is a place to play, for others it is something
to be suffered.
>Not everyone is. You were. You escaped. Don't assume that all those left
>behind are in the trap you were caught in.
"All" is a very large word for its size. I know many who remain caged
in the machine that held me. I know there are some who enjoy the
library.
>Find your bliss.
>
>> I'm too busy working on my version this morning to really talk well
>> about it in the abstract. Feel free to poke-poke and continue the
>> discussion, or not, as you wish.
>
>Talk with Zero about brainwash.
Prolly not, Sal. Zero seems to be grabbing for something that I
consider to be covered with sharpnesses and totally undesirable. On
the other hand, who knows.
boots
What have you done here but allude to them?
Personally I have a work/family balance that is beyond improvement,
there is nothing to balance because it is all one thing.
Of course the income sucks, but eventually that will work itself out.
For now I am concentrating on minimizing the outgo, which is around
10% of what it was when I was in the city. Perhaps 5%, it's not
easily calculable.
$Zero
> Towse <se...@towse.com> wrote:
> >Talk with Zero about brainwash.
>
> Prolly not, Sal. Zero seems to be grabbing for something that I
> consider to be covered with sharpnesses and totally undesirable. On
> the other hand, who knows.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1LWg1jFp4E&eurl
-$Zero...