just a little something to provoke thought...
But, to be less abstract (and more serious): even if it were true that Instagram is simply and singularly a place for sepia-toned and badly-composed images to await the eyes of our children (just dying to know more about us), those very images would say plenty. In addition to documenting the world we lived in—from gadget fetish to meme obsession—they would also tell the story of a deeply nostalgic society. So many people are so taken by the associations and aesthetics of filters and effects that alter images to appear like those of another time, made by the mechanisms of other, more tangible machines than the shiny lozenges in our pockets (lozenges upon which, until last week, the hardware disappeared with a Jobsian flourish at the moment we engaged the home button). This desire for authenticity, even in the form of software’s simulacra, says so much about who we are now, and the way our world looks. As for filter-free Instagrams? The most revealing aspect of those images is not the clarity and “honesty” they provide, it’s the oft-tapped and self-righteous footnote they are so often delivered to the world with: #nofilter. Filter or no, we are a people repeatedly revealing our need for authenticity.
via http://robertjosiah.net/written/13473154/instagram
But, to be less abstract (and more serious): even if it were true that Instagram is simply and singularly a place for sepia-toned and badly-composed images to await the eyes of our children (just dying to know more about us), those very images would say plenty. In addition to documenting the world we lived in—from gadget fetish to meme obsession—they would also tell the story of a deeply nostalgic society. So many people are so taken by the associations and aesthetics of filters and effects that alter images to appear like those of another time, made by the mechanisms of other, more tangible machines than the shiny lozenges in our pockets (lozenges upon which, until last week, the hardware disappeared with a Jobsian flourish at the moment we engaged the home button). This desire for authenticity, even in the form of software’s simulacra, says so much about who we are now, and the way our world looks. As for filter-free Instagrams? The most revealing aspect of those images is not the clarity and “honesty” they provide, it’s the oft-tapped and self-righteous footnote they are so often delivered to the world with: #nofilter. Filter or no, we are a people repeatedly revealing our need for authenticity.
via http://robertjosiah.net/written/13473154/instagram
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