The Digital Age

 

It feels like we're entering the Digital Age.

 

Actually, it feels like everyone else entered the Digital Age several years ago, and we're just catching up.  MP3 players have been around for years, and the kids have been using them for a long time, but we don't have one set up on our home entertainment system.  We still use this old-fashioned thing called "commercial radio" and these round discs called "CDs" and "DVDs".  Now there's this thing called "digital streaming" which also has been around a long time, and we're just getting to the point of utilizing it.

 

It's certainly addictive.

 

And convenient.

 

Too convenient.

 

There's a serious issue related to this convenience. Have you seen the number of movies that are available on these streaming services?  Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, Hulu Plus, and all the myriad host of others contain thousands upon thousands of hours of entertainment, far more than the number of hours left in a person's lifetime.  How does one choose how to spend one's time?  Watching the Classics?  Watching old television shows from one's youth?  Watching the new movies and television shows so as to catch up with the culture?

 

Back in the "old" days, it was easy because the pace of transmission was only slightly higher than the pace of one's ability to keep up.  Back in the days when there were three or at most four channels (ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS), one could watch one or two hours of television per night and feel that one had done one's duty to keep pace with the nation.  Then came cable, then satellite, and now digital streaming.   Hundreds if not thousands of choices to make every moment of every day.

 

America is a wonderful country.  It provides opportunities for people to create wonderful things, devices, entertainments.  But after a while, the number of choices becomes overwhelming.  Have you taken stock lately of the incredible number of choices available on the grocery store shelves? Have you tried to shop for light bulbs lately?  How does one decide which to choose among the vast array of possibilities?

 

It is bewildering.

 

It is terrifying.

 

It is the kind of thing that makes me want to curl up next to my little garden and focus on nothing more complicated than feeding and watering the plants.

 

It is the kind of thing that makes me want to go out into my shop and spend hours cutting and sanding and shaping and polishing a block of wood into a useful item of furniture that will withstand years of use.

 

It is the kind of thing that makes me want to sit at my little electronics bench and spend hours wiring up a circuit that will perform some useful function.

 

It is the kind of thing that makes me want to retreat to my little downstairs writing desk and work on my forthcoming novel.

 

And I'm going to do all those things.

 

Right after I finish watching this episode of Star Trek.