Recent events in Norway (which I described briefly in my last entry) have proven that society, or more importantly the flow of information, has changed. With smartphones and mobile internet, not to mention social networks such as Twitter and Facebook, information got out about the attack a very short time after it started. The cries for help are still there, posted as public announcements rather than private calls to the police.
This kind of information flow reminds me of the concept of hiveminds, and in many ways we're on our way there. While information used to move between single nodes (in this case, single persons), there are currently central sources of information that people connect to instead. Today when something happens, one can say that the central source is notified and it instantly spreads to practically everyone.
But there's more to it than that!
For a while now I've been pondering my own declining memory. I'm completely useless when it comes to memorizing things. After reading about recent studies it's begun to dawn on me; we as a species are beginning to outsource the storage of information. Rather than remember e.g. how a car engine works, we're remembering how to retrieve that information. With our devices at hand, we can retrieve more information than ever before in mere moments. Of course, the negative side of this is that it's slower than what it would be if one had it memorized, and without our gadgets we're stranded.
This is a very fascinating subject, and I'll get back to it.
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