on communication

So let's see, to share with you what I've been up to in the library-world:
The last few days have been rainy and cold, kids have been off of school so it's usually deathly quiet until around 2, which is when people finally get the nerve to go out into the cold and come to the library. It's been fun, with the exception of harrassing tweens and teens to pick up their wrappers from the candy they bought at the Dollar Store, it's been okay. It gives me time to work on things in the morning, and then slowly work myself into the rush that comes in the afternoon.

And in the Archives:
The building in which the archives is located is currently being remodeled...and leaving me in a bit of a quandry. I ordered 30 file boxes which arrived much sooner than I thought they would...so the "project" of expanding and reorganizing the file boxes could start as soon as, well, NOW...but with moving things around and redecorating everything, I hardly want to begin this massive project and then have to re-re-organize it in order to move boxes around the painters/decorators, etc. So right now, the archives looks a little like a failed garage sale back in my "corner" of the place- I'm hoping I can get started on it maybe in February!? I don't know. But that job is going well too- just crazy how much backlog ends up happening. I'm still getting used to what's already there, and people keep "donating things" which makes it even harder to handle. I really like it though. A lot.

Recently in the news it was mentioned that Barack Obama will have to surrender his blackberry and email address. I understand why- I get it. It doesn't exactly make sense that our president's blackberry go off during a meeting with some important world figure or during a press conference. In order to get a hold of the President, people should have to get through the security sheath around him so it seems only fair that he doesn't get to use them anymore...fair to the american people in that it makes him less susceptible to hackers and whatnot, and if normal citizens don't get to tell him something we think is important via text, than I think no one should be able to either- but that's mainly me being selfish.

I started thinking about it further. A friend of mine recently went to work for the federal government, and during the interview process they mentioned knowing she had a facebook page (DUH- a simple search can reveal all of that ) and then the same people who were interviewing and mentioning this made a comment about "facebook, isn't that mostly for people to get together and find other people to have sex with?" Um....DUDE. No. My Aunt Pam is on there. My mom has a facebook page. My school, my work, everyone has a facebook page. I don't even like facebook and I have a facebook page. It's almost a necessity to connect with people I'd lost touch with- and is the ONLY kind of contact I have with many people. Same thing with Myspace and email. Said friend ended up deleting her account after that, which I understand, because if my employer was so clueless and thought I was soliciting sex online, I would certainly oblige and take down the page in order to get a job that pays 3x as much as the one I previously had. I suppose that's the price one has to pay.

I miss my friend not being on Facebook. I have no idea what her new place looks like in another state, and she doesn't know what's going on back home. That's not to say that she's particularly interested in my daily "status updates" but still- cutting off even one form of communication makes people feel further apart.

Then I started thinking about how many people I only (or mostly) contact via text message. I think my boyfriend and I have talked on the phone a total of 12 times in a year, because we text message. Even my boss text messages me. And email- I mean, email is how everyone (my age) does everything! How else am I going to get my resume, notes to myself from different email addresses, forwards about kitties and babies, etc?! I mean- this is important stuff!

As a public service librarian, when I think about how forward-thinking the library is, in that it realizes that part of BEING a library is becoming a community center for people, being accessible to all people, the more I wonder when or if the government will ever understand or have a handle on that. THe library has a facebook page, a myspace page, a flickr page, a youtube page, a blog, etc. Regarding the government, well --I know that Obama having a blackberry is probably not a possibility, but at some point the government will need to understand the nature of the social web, and how much of the generations coming up rely on them SOLELY as a means for communication. It doesn't surprise me that George W. Bush's email address was an aol account (oh that did make me chuckle though), and he didn't really see it as much of a problem to not use it anymore. But I wonder for the future leaders of the free world- will they survive without electronic means of communication? Particularly if that's the only way they are accustomed to communicating?

All I know is if you made me delete mine, I would be in a world of hurt- and I wouldn't talk to anyone. Ever. That means old college chums, family members, boyfriends, friends, employers, networking associates, anyone.

At the same time, the archvisit part of me is constantly wondering how to archive all of this "digital living and connecting" I'm doing. For the first 17 years of my life i wrote in books and on paper, which I have stored accordingly. But with the digital stuff, it's so massive and how do we keep that for archival purposes? This is the stuff that really got me thinking and pondering in school- and I'm not in school now, but I DID just have my Trip to England blog printed into book format, because that one I want to be SURE to remember. My myspace (aka therapeutic rambling) blog is more than likely gone-for-good when that technology becomes obsolete. I've emailed "Tom" and "Customer Service" more than once to find out about the blog archives and how they're stored (if at all) and if I'd be able to upload that (ever) into a format that's printable-- and that Tom character never emailed me back. Jerk.

Just think of all the communication that occurs digitally that will eventually be GONE- POOF! In an age where laptops are getting smaller and smaller, and programs become increasingly high-tech, better, worse, unable to work with other hardware, etc....it's alarming! I mean, I got an iPod (my SECOND iPod) just over a year ago and already when I walk into the Apple Store for advice on things they look at me like I am carrying a VCR around or a toaster oven- like, "Oh look at that old lady with her old piece of equipment she'd like to have serviced"

Things change people- and they change FAST!

There's a huge disconnect here between what's being archived, and what's not- between generations of people and how they communicate-- and I'm wondering what the next few decades will hold and if anyone has given this a thought. WE'll see I suppose.

Okay I'm off to check all my pages and see what people are up to today.