That roar which lies on the other side of silence*

Magnet #236 - Mouth...from Corbis

Another piece of magnetswag from our friends at Corbis.

We used to live in a world where communications went one way - advertisers told us what to think about products and companies, and the only way for them to know what we were thinking was through focus groups and sales.

Now, with something like 10 million bloggers, a gajillion message boards and dozens of social networking sites - everyone's got an opinion, and aren't afraid to express it. Whether it's posting a comment to a blog or message board, or changing a FB or Twitter status, everyone's got a voice on the Internet.

I'm no exception. I've gone a little post happy. For some reason I've moved from "why in the hell would I need a blog, it's not like anyone would give a crap about what I want to say" to "OMG, ITA, and here's why!" It's almost become a knee-jerk reaction to want to respond to blogposts and newsarticles.

Except I might need to rein it in a bit. Just the other day, I was reading on the train, and I felt the need to respond quickly with my thoughts. And by that, I mean, my fingers physically moved to look for the Post a Comment button.

I was on a train, people!

Reading a BOOK.



*"We do not expect people to be deeply moved by what is not unusual...if we had a keen vision and feeling of all ordinary human life, it would be like hearing the grass grow and the squirrel's heart beat, and we should die of that roar which lies on the other side of silence."

- George Eliot, Middlemarch

eta:
Here's something that a blogger can do. Rail against Cesar at Time Warner Cable Customer Service. He's MEAN. And? Didn't even freakin' apologize for the fact that the DVR just obliterated 2 weeks of programming off of my DVR. Wow. I used to LOVE Time Warner Cable. I know your job sucks worse than mine, but what happened to customer service with a freakin' smile. Bite me, Cesar.

And, I'm *totally* repeating this when I find an appropriate magnet.