themortalitybook.tumblr.com

YOU’RE HISTORY.

click this.

themortalitybook.tumblr.com

(the) mortalitybook click this #4

YOU’RE HISTORY.

Because of this mass digitizing of all the data there ever was or is, to have no record of ourselves could eventually mean that we

NEVER EXISTED.

And who wants that? Certainly not all of the 1.78 million Facebook users that are expected to die annually.*

“When the record goes, so too do we, and to leave no record is much like never being born at all.”

-Charlton In a sense, Facebook literally becomes history.

themortalitybook.tumblr.com

“Social networking will surpass diaries, photo albums, and paper correspondence; it will supersede email and telephonic communication; it will even trump television, radio, and newspapers…”

-Ken

Do you have a Twitter? If you do, you’re already making a digital archive, and you can’t do anything about it. That is, unless you want to

challenge the U.S. Library of Congress, because that’s where all your tweets are being recorded on what is called

THE WAYBACK MACHINE. This started in March 2006.

Speaking of tweets.

Have you ever asked yourself,

“WHY THE HELL ARE WE TWEETING IN THE FIRST PLACE?”

Ponder this:

“Yet among all the variety of human expression, a thread of connection, a common mark, can be seen. That urge to look into one’s self and out at the world and say, ‘This is what I AM. I am unique. I AM here. I AM.’”

-Saul Bass, graphic designer and filmmaker

(from Why Men Create)

themortalitybook.tumblr.com

Tweeting is micro-writing, micro-painting, micro-filmmaking. It’s part of that

“CAPTURING OF THE HUMAN EXPERIENCE”

that’s in everything we do. It’s making our mark on the universe (see

click this #2, “2050: A Social Odyssey”).

Put simply, it’s

“I AM-ING.”

Instead of making our marks on brick walls and street lamps, we’re grafitting the internet. It’s what drives our every post. Think about it: if

we know we’re going to become history, we want to make a splash, right?

But

SOMETHING ELSE has happened in the middle of all this digital I am-ing…

…Keep scrolling.

@ @ @

I AM.

themortalitybook.tumblr.com

scroll further *as of 2011. Learn more about the Wayback Machine: http://archive.org/web/web.php http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wayback_Machine images and font Suttonhoo. “spine.png.” Detritus. Blogspot, 28 Sep 2009. Web. 18 Apr

2012. <http://suttonhoo.blogspot.com/2009_09_01_archive.html>.

Poietes. “old-book-spines.jpg.” Lola’s Curmudgeonly Musings on Life,

Love & Other Trifles. WordPress.com, n.d. Web. 19 Apr 2012. <http://poietes.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/old-book-spines.jpg>.

Wong, Leslie. “Barred Spiral Galaxy NGC 1300.” A Leslie Wong Blog.

Wordpress.com, 26 Nov 2007. Web. 21 Apr 2012. <http://www.lesliewong.us/blog/2007/11/26/hubblesite/>.

The font used for emphasis here is Black Sam’s Gold by Redruth’s Basement Software.