An introduction to me and web culture
Andrew T
“I think you should care because there are 29, 542 people in Facebook’s University of Guelph network. I think you should care because my friend Scott watched an internet-only broadcast of the Golden Globes Sunday night”
Good morning angels,
My name is Andrew T. I’ve clawed, gnashed, gnoshed, and screamed to get this column. Thanks for reading.
Actually, no-that’s not nearly a strong enough measure of how I feel. A truly strong measure would be pints, quarts, or an electromagnetic spectrometer.
Don’t know what that is? Look it up.
Not only am I thanking you for reading this column, but also for the time and attention that I KNOW you’ll be dedicating to it in the future. I’m touched that you are sparing your ten spare minutes on me. But who am I? What am I doing here? How many falafels can you fit into a pita? (Trick question: It depends on the size of the pita) Let’s figure this out!
So, as my Tumblr blog says (desirefortiger.tumblr.com), I’m addicted to the Internet. More specifically (but also more broadly) I’m strongly fixated on new media and issues surrounding content creation, appropriation, and dissemination. Sounds boring when I say it like that… *Ahem* I’m into Remixing! Youtube! Facebook! WordPress! Tumblr! Twitter! Sharing music! Sharing movies! Downloading! Uploading! TeamSpeak! Memes! And Kanye West! That sounds a LOT cooler, right? Right?
Why do you care? I mean, you do care, right? If you don’t yet, I bet you really want to. And I want you to. I want you to want me. I need you to need me. I’d love you to love me. I’m beggin’ you to beg me. (Where am I going with this? Reign it in Andrew!)
I think you should care because there are 29, 542 people in Facebook’s University of Guelph network. I think you should care because my friend Scott watched an internet-only broadcast of the Golden Globes Sunday night…I have run out of reasons. There’s always the fallback of saying that, “I think you should care because if you don’t, then I won’t have an audience for my column, and then I won’t have a column, and then I’ll be all alone!” but that joke sucks and I can come up with a better one! The better joke is that if you don’t care, then there may be truth to the old adage “A man is known by the company he keeps.” And if there’s a truth to that, then there’s probably truth to millions of other adages. “Measure twice, cut once,” “He who rides a tiger can never dismount,” and “Nothing changes if nothing changes” all suddenly became relevant to my life. And if I’m part of an internet community— one where I share photos of my new haircuts and talk about riding tigers at tiger ranches and post designs of great tiger haircuts—then it matters to them! Because I matter to them! Even if I don’t matter to you, I matter to them! I’ll find an audience!
Right now, my audience is you. You are the people who I want to matter to the most. Uh…that might not be true.
But what is true is that things actually are changing, and while you may not think you’re changing much, you are. By being online, by seeing a movie, by buying a record, or by not participating in any of it, you’re making your voice/money be heard. There is actually value in signing an online petition. Viral videos can be a totally respected artistic thing. Writing a blog says more about you than simply whatever you post on your Livejournal (or whatever kids use these days). I think that media is killer and key to our day-to-day lives as students, as Canadians, and as young people in and around Guelph. (Author’s Note: Oh. Yeah. Old people, please stop reading this. I should’ve mentioned that earlier.) So I will write about it, you will read about it, and I hope that while we can both be taking something away from this experience, you’ll also give me something. I WANT YOUR E-MAILS!!! Please. If you’ve got questions, comments, suggestions, concerns, recipes, or quotas, send them to me at andrewt.press@gmail.com. That IS my real e-mail address, so I’m trusting you to respect the system. If you send me things, then I can write them back to you. We can actually build and improve upon this system of creation and feedback that modern communications technologies afford us. We can talk. It’d be better if you gave up this feedback willingly. Otherwise, I am willing to try and reenact The Temple of Doom on you, specifically the part where the cult leader reaches into the dudes chest and rips out his heart! But instead of hearts, I’ll be ripping e-mails! Kali Ma! Kali Ma! Kali Ma!
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Upon further reflection and editing, I’d like to apologize for most of this column.