I am not an early adopter. You know one, I am certain. Early adopters are people who are the first to try out new technologies. They stand in line overnight for the opportunity to get on a waiting list to spend hundreds of dollars to get the next iPhone or the improved gaming system.
They welcome the chance to beta test new machines or software. They quickly master updates in operating systems and are not afraid to change the factory settings on every phone, computer or netbook they touch.
They are not like me.
Don't misunderstand. I like technology. I'm dating myself when I say this, but I learned computer coding in high school.....using fortran.....on computer cards.....that you protected at all cost because any misplaced card could result in total program failure. I played computer games on televisions that were connected to cassette tape recorders that sent commands as streams of shrill beeps.
There were a handful of us in my high school. I seem to remember I was the only female. I was definitely the only one that understood hygiene. That, however, was a while ago.....quite a while ago. Back before Bill Gates made nerdy-intellectualism attractive.....valuable......an asset.
These days I know how to use the technology I encounter. I can deal with the frustrations of printers that suddenly decide they no longer wish to allow your computer to communicate with them. I understand the importance of scheduled back-ups on external hard drives, even if I don't always do them as scheduled. I can even generally grasp the concept of cloud storage and the potential of Google Docs to speed multi-directional communication within groups.
However, until earlier this summer, I hadn't forayed out into the ocean of pins and boards and followers generally referred to as Pinterest.
My teenage daughters have been "pinning" for quite a while and have lots of boards that they follow and they are followed in turn by others, sharing and re-sharing the same set of pictures of beloved actors, anime characters, bands, hairstyle hints, visual puns, video game cheats, and so on and so on. You name it, there's sure to be someone commenting about it, adding a picture showing it or making a meme to mock it.
So, I ventured out into this ocean of pictures and thoughts and ideas. I was asked, when I set up my account, to choose to "follow" a few boards. Places were suggested based on broad topics: books, cooking, movies. I was immediately overwhelmed by the number of images which I was encouraged to "pin" to my own boards about books or cooking or movies. GAAAH!! Too much, too much!!!!
It took weeks for me to attempt such overload again. And then only because I was in search of specific information to address a specific need I had. AND my Google search kept sending me to Pinterest boards.
Ok, I thought, I'll try again. This time I ignored everything that showed up at the beginning and searched for what I really wanted. And found it. Still too much of it. And way more of it than I could ever actual look at and read, let alone use.
But I did create a board for myself. A place to keep the things I'd found that were of interest to me, so I wouldn't have to search for them again when I really needed them.
I didn't pin much that first day. And I don't add much now. But every so often, as I find a thing or two of interest and value in the huge expanse of the internet, I add them to my board. I've also created a thing or two myself as I've found something in the analog world that I'd like to add to my digital world.
And then something crazy happened. Someone found me, found my board among the millions in the digital universe, liked what she saw and started to follow me.
For those who use Pinterest often, no big deal. My daughters have hundreds of followers. For them, that's the point of Pinterest. But for me, Pinterest was just a place I was storing things for me, so that I could find them again, so I wouldn't have to use memory on my computer.
But now....there's someone else out there. Looking at what I've found and liking it enough to want to see what ELSE I might find. It felt odd.
I know, I write a blog. But virtually no one reads this. Not even my own family. Most people don't even know I have one. I don't do it for anyone but me. Just to keep writing. Stream of consciousness thing, really. And I don't write often. Very, very infrequently.
But now there's someone out there, someone I don't even know, who is informed immediately of everything that I pin to my board.
Like I said, it felt odd. But ok, that's way things are. Feels odd that someone else was watching what I was doing, but I kept saving things I found, I liked, I created. And then yesterday someone else started following me.
I know, two people out of the billions on the internet. But for me, it's kinda eerie. Like realizing, too late, that you left the shades open when you changed the sheets on the bed and put away the clean laundry last night. Nothing really to see, but if someone looked up at just the right moment they would be able to see you. It just feels odd.
SO, Pinterest may be a lot of things to a lot of people....but to me, the best visual is slowly driving down a dark street looking into the open lit windows of all the houses, checking out what's been made for dinner or watched on television. And when you "follow" someone....it's kinda like you're stalking their brains, watching to see what they think, what they like.
Creepy when you consider it like that, huh? Are you starting to feel like someone's reading over your shoulder? Me, too.
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