there was a time when everybody watched "the cosby show"
on thursday nights at 8:00.


there was a time when everybody watched "t.g.i.f"
friday night lineup.


hell, there was a time when all of the children
watched the same block of cartoons every saturday morning.




the world isn't like that anymore.
in the 80s, everybody on the planet knew who michael jackson was,
even if you didn't particularly care for his music,
you knew who he was.





nowadays, an artist can go platinum 10 times
and there is a pretty good chance that the old lady working next to you in the cubicle has never heard of her.




and in a lot of ways, the internet has torn people apart.
everybody can get their news in their own favorite websites.
and all of their friends that agree with them go to the same websites.


meanwhile, other people in the world are living in their own bubble.
they are getting their news from an entirely different source
and the two worlds will never, ever connect.



nowadays, music just isn't as important as it was.
there is no such thing as a "blockbuster album" that everybody
has heard because albums are competing with the internet
and x-box and 1,000 chanells on direct tv.

and the album is also competing with the fact that everybody
can download the music that THEY want to hear on the internet
and not have to pay attention to whatever is being marketed as popular.

so if a person wants to download nothing but acoustic folks music,
they can. they can get their fix without having to
pay attention to any music that other folks are listening to.






so yeah, the world is bigger now.
no collective experiences.

the closest thing we've had to a universal cultural phenomenon
was obama in '08. and the 9/11 terror attacks.



beyond that, we're all in our own little bubble.
we don't listen to the same things anymore.

like i said, the world is bigger.


>the same technology pundits who would tout the internet as
>means of "leveling the playing field for indie musicians"
>would be the same people who would argue the internet has made
>everything quicker and smaller with social media...
>i.e. you can upload a video from your smartphone literally
>seconds after it happened. opine your witty remarks to the
>adulation of no one, seconds after coming up with them, share
>everything with everyone immediately.
>
>like what are you even talking about?
>if anything the "information superhighway" is argued as a
>means of bringing people together and making things more like
>the "global village" marshall mcluhan theorized.
>
>