My initial fascination with the internet back in the late 90s and ongoing was the sense that all of humanity's quirks & eccentricities was slowly growing into cyberspace. What was forming was a huge superconsciousness fueled by porn and cat memes. (For what it's worth, cats currently outnumber porn) A new evolution of consciousness was upon us.
As make-your-site places popped up, like geocities and angelfire, you got a true glimpse into people and their individual qabalahs for better or for worse. I joined in the best I could, in those days of heavy shamanic self-medication, randomly creating accounts, dropping rants and then finds new places to sprinkle with my prose. It was more personal as the content was created rathered than the recycled posting that happens on social media now.
My father-in-law has been going slowly deaf most of his adult life. Years as a solitary self-employed lumberer tethered him to his own thoughts as the chainsaws help eat away at his hearing. He is retired now. Recently the Papa and his new bride went and acquired iPhones, stepping bodly into the 21st century, tickled by the thoughts of being able to speak to the computers help in their hands.
The Papa continues to be a man of nature. The sunrise finds him up and ready for a walk. He drives off to secluded spots with his trusted companion Windy and spends the first several hours of the day getting thick with nature.
The new iPhone has made this ritual a little different. The Papa sends out dozens of photos & videos to his children, bride and grandson of his morning explorations complete with the type of in-joke ridden captions you expect from a man who doesn't let the silence stop him from thinking. When asked he apologized for not putting me on the list but I insisted. This is what I enjoyed, 21st technology sharing with us the poetry of a man's soul. The is what the internet, the Great Glass Bead Game, is for.