I've noticed a growing trend of late amongst my brother and sister roller coaster enthusiasts. Periodic updates on Facebook while at a park.
While Twitter has been around for a while now, it seems the Facebook equivalent feature is picking up steam (well of course I HAD to make a Steampunk reference...don't be ridiculous!).
To those unfamiliar, Twitter (http://www.twitter.com/) is a micro-blogging service where members send "tweets" or text messages of 150 characters or less as often as desired. Yes it's agreat way to stalk, er, keep up with your favorite random people going about their daily lives.
Facebook boasts a similar feature that has allowed for similar kinds of updates on a member's "wall". Couple that with more and more people carrying smart phones, iPhones, or Blackberrys, and you have a growing system of reporting / living vicariously in almost real time.
For the record, the creative and tech savvy among us (obviously I'm out considering my "The Digital Life?!" series here on the blog) can do something similar with a regular blog and a lot of short updates from a Blackberry.
While I've noticed all this and even tested some of it out last fall at Dollywood, what does this latest movement really mean for enthusiasts and how they deliver trip reports or just enjoy parks?
I think you'll see even more people glued to phones and texting in line at the parks. This could be good and bad. Good, in that you get a better idea of the weather and general operating conditions of the park before you get there. If it's pouring rain and most of the coasters are closed, such as the case at Six Flags over Georgia (Thanks to John Turner for this past weekend updates on Facebook), why drive out and spend money knowing it's an iffy day at best? It's also bad in that there will be even more people, even more distracted, and not paying attention to the world around them. And, unfortunately, accidents can happen to the unwary all too often.
Ultimately, it's a good bet you'll see more updates from people going to parks, so you can squirm in jealously as they say "Just got off Goliath after 2 front row rides and only a 15 minute wait!" This will be music to the ears of die-hard fanboys, fiercely dedicated to any given park. To the rest of us, it will be the creative people who embrace and grow this trend, that will show just how much it can benefit the enthusiast community and beyond.
Yep, just something I noticed. We'll just watch it and see.
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2 comments:
I agree there's good and bad. Twitter especially seems to be really good for letting people communicate instantly about conditions. People can spread the word quickly if a ride is down or something crazy new and awesome has been discovered.
The bad you mention I think is an adaptive thing. Yes, people will be more distracted, but I think there's an upper limit to the mind-space that can't be gone over until there's an evolutionary upgrade. People will modify themselves after a while.
What I think you will probably see is a form of psychological retreat behavior. People deleting or suddenly breaking away from their feeds and disappearing from the Borg collective for periods of Hermit-age.
That can be disturbing for people still jacked in, and I'm not sure what the effect means in terms of outcome. Are we looking at something like Johnny Mnemonic, a psychological/physiological tartar build up?
The collective can have a harmful effect on individual primary cell awareness. Too soon to tell maybe, what this means in terms of being jacked in.
Now that is an interesting perspective on a possible outcome. A general sociatal reverse trend. Very cool!
And always glad to see you on here. Thanks for stopping by!
Heh, I need to catch up on your blog soon too, friend. Cheers!
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