Gooboo Tiktube

A child of the Computer Age? Me? Go ahead and make your day and laugh out loud. My first personal computer, an Apple IIc I bought in 1984. Oooo, 1984. I was 31. Now, of course, 31 seems young to me, but I'll let the point stand.

As for social media--specifically Facebook--I was invited on by former students roughly a dozen years ago. I Googled before that, started YouTubing several years ago, and now am TikToking as well.

And yet I still find texting beyond a short sentence a labor of, well, labor. 

Is Google an empire for good or for evil? I don't know, but I Google for a bucket of reasons via emailing, mapping, blogging, and searching. I do know I can refuse to post comments on my blog and mark emailers as spammers. 

Let me put my big boy pants on: Google (Alphabet, I guess) can dump me as it sees fit from its various services. Ita mundus vadit.

Thirty years ago if I wanted to make my writing public, most platforms would have been controlled by publishers and editors and commercial considerations. Now I can blog or not as I feel inclined. For better or worse, I'll concede.

Twenty years ago if I wanted to share a video of my yard with my parents I wouldn't have been able to upload to YouTube and send them a link via email so they could watch independent of my schedule. 

And I can disable comments. Yee. Haw.

Big boy pants: YouTube can drop me as it so deems. So, erwachsen verden!

My TikTok videos generate 200-300 views roughly for a short look at some particular plant. A friend suggested the idea, which I found mildly amusing. No commentary, just point and shoot--hahaha! But, shows what I know, which is nearly nothing. Who knew?

Big boy pants: TikTok can banish me for eternity. So, fermez-la!

Even I know--incredibly--Facebook is in the throes of a major dust up with just about everyone apparently. Sure, I'd like an obnoxiousness filter applied and that algorithm would by my reckoning toss out the vicious, the racist, the misogynous, the lurid, the vomit-spewers (metaphorically), et al.

But I don't see that crap. My acquaintances and friends just share little hits of endorphins as I see it. Kids' Halloween costumes, a dog licking its owner's face, former students landing dream jobs, colleagues retiring into their happy places, maybe a friend scoring a hole in one.

Me, too. My dog, some flowers or cucumbers growing, little endorphin shots. A witty comment, maybe, from time to time.

Big boy pants: Facebook (Uh, Meta) may disappear me at its pleasure. So it goes.

So read my blog, or don't. Watch my videos, or don't. Check out my posts, or don't.

But, to one another, do be kind.