
Nostalgia for Now - pepys
http://wilsonquarterly.com/stories/nostalgia-for-now/
======
ashark
Spot on with our ability to preserve the past being the cause of this.

Someone born in 1940 didn't grow up watching their favorite children's movies
over and over and over on VHS, you know? You missed something then, it was
often just _gone_. Maybe there'd be a picture or two of the event (or stills
from the film) in a book somewhere in the library. (granted, yes, _now_ they
can go back and see that stuff, probably, but they couldn't in, say, the 60s
or 70s, for the most part)

It's been trending this way since the camera and phonograph were invented, but
things _really_ took off right around the 80s—walkman, home camcorders
becoming more affordable and the media cheaper, VCR, cassette tape, and so on.

It's only going to get worse. Kids born today will very likely be able to walk
around entire recorded 3D _environments_ from their youth. Grandma's house at
Christmastime when you were 9 years old? Done. Maybe we'll even be able to
reconstruct semi-interactive versions of the people who were there. Your
junior year high school dance? Don't see pictures and video of it, _live it_
again. We'll see what effects that has on culture when it comes, I guess.

~~~
nsxwolf
You see the dark side of that kind of nostalgia in movies like Strange Days
and Minority Report. There's a real danger to continually reliving the
memories that should ordinarily fade into the past. It's almost a sort of self
inflicted PTSD.

------
Nadya
_> A few seconds later, I looked back at the family to see how their picture
was turning out. They were gone. They didn’t want to see Niagara Falls. They
wanted a picture so that they could be seen forever standing in front of
Niagara Falls._

This line jumped out to me - because it is how my mother is. She wants a photo
for the memory but never pauses for the memory itself. She was confused when I
visited a foreign country for the first time and _didn 't take a single
picture_. Myself and the author seem to share the same feeling of wanting to
experience something, not keep proof of it contained in a photo.

I still take photographs. But I do so to remember how things were. The photos
I have of my family are mostly candid shots of them doing some mundane task
and the idea of "3-2-1 cheese" is missing entirely. My grandmother bringing a
birthday cake to my nephew, a smile on their faces. My sister investigating
her sea monkeys with a look of curiosity. Things like that. Because they might
not remember the experience - but I'm sure they'll remember being there. The
experience, to me, is the important thing to photograph and not the fact they
were there.

It's for that reason I find "selfie culture" to be somber. They aren't
photographing the experience - they're documenting that "they were there" and
they have proof they were because they have a selfie. But they _know_ they
were there so what is the selfie for?

~~~
sosuke
"They didn't want to see Niagara Falls"

But they did see it and then they had to run off to the next thing they needed
to see. They just didn't have time to soak up the view and wait. There was
something else waiting for them, a cab, a dinner, a flight, a job, a child, a
pet or countless other distractions.

Every time I get to take even a minute to see something I cherish it. Then I
have to run off to the next task to do.

I'm not sure I agree with the authors projection of possible motives of those
they were observing. There is always danger in assuming you know what is going
through someone else's mind.

~~~
coldtea
> _Every time I get to take even a minute to see something I cherish it. Then
> I have to run off to the next task to do._

Only people do the same on their spare time, for the whole duration of events,
in the holidays, etc. Where there is no other pressing thing waiting for them
like a flight, a job or a child. Besides all of those things could wait for 10
minutes.

As for non pressing things and "countless other distractions", that's the
whole point of the author. They don't appreciate or cherish or stop to look at
the things they visit, they just pass through to the next thing.

> _I 'm not sure I agree with the authors projection of possible motives of
> those they were observing. There is always danger in assuming you know what
> is going through someone else's mind._

Only we do know what's in most people's minds, it's mindless consumption of
places and experiences, where they care more to post they've been there than
of actually being there. Not to mention that the vast majority of those images
(countless photos taken during a concert for example) nobody absolutely cares,
not even the picture taking them will think about them twice.

~~~
brennen
> mindless consumption

It's funny how rarely I see people describing their _own_ actions in these
terms, though. I mean, I'm sure it happens, but the dominant mode seems more
like "my behavior is authentic, those other people are being fake".

I get annoyed by phonecam-mediated behavior in its extremes, for sure, but I
sometimes wonder if I'm not being perceived that way when I'm doing things
(sharing a concert photo with a friend who couldn't make it; trying to get
just the right angle and exposure on some striking scene) that feel
"authentic" inside my own head.

~~~
coldtea
> _It 's funny how rarely I see people describing their own actions in these
> terms, though. I mean, I'm sure it happens, but the dominant mode seems more
> like "my behavior is authentic, those other people are being fake"._

I have been guilty of mindless consumption myself.

I any case, it's the mode of consumption that makes it mindless, not the
persons intent (or lack thereof).

------
mobiletelephone
The highlight for me:

I’d waited 30 years to experience the wonder, and finally I was there,
standing what seemed like mere yards away from one of the falls, vainly
wearing a yellow poncho that was somehow supposed to keep me dry from the
spray of water. The roar of the thing causing my insides to pound, the smell
of wet rock, the mist almost too thick to see through — the moment was
overwhelming.

Suddenly, a hand tapped me on the shoulder, and a young man about my age asked
me in broken English if I would move away from where I was standing. He and
his family wanted to take a picture in front of the falls, and I, rudely
enough, was in their frame.

I wanted to deny his request, to tell their family, in my own broken French,
that they would have to wait until I was finished experiencing the falls, or,
better yet, that they should turn away from their cameras and have real-life
experiences of their own. But I considered that noncompliance would seem rude,
and so, taking one final look at the waterfall, nodded and left to find my
partner. A few seconds later, I looked back at the family to see how their
picture was turning out. They were gone. They didn’t want to see Niagara
Falls. They wanted a picture so that they could be seen forever standing in
front of Niagara Falls.

~~~
icebraining
I wonder if the author enjoys the Niagara Falls, or if they just enjoy
thinking of themselves as someone who enjoys the Niagara Falls, unlike the
masses with their cameras and lack of sense of propriety.

------
rolodato
This has eloquently described one of the reasons why I and many close friends
have quit Facebook, well done. I did expect to see Mr Robot mentioned there,
which mentions similar issues as well (although not as elegantly as Black
Mirror, perhaps).

I've seen many instances of this revolting phenomenon at concerts. Illuminated
audiences with arms raised, blocking the view of others and ruining their own
experience, just to capture some blurry photo or shaky video with distorted
audio.

As a millenial I grew up a diehard technophile, and even after becoming a
software engineer and being fully immersed in technology daily, I've become
wary and mistrusting of many "innovations". I don't know if this is a natural
process of maturing (get off my lawn?) or if we are slowly realizing how
damaging these new habits can be.

------
jamesmiller5
It's most interesting that the vaporwave art form mixes nostalgia with
subversion. Instead of just experiencing the past, it normally critiques it.
For example, Hologram Plaza shows the darker side of 90's consumerism by
portraying how soulless & empty visiting a mall can feel.

Hologram Plaza - [https://disconscious.bandcamp.com/album/hologram-
plaza](https://disconscious.bandcamp.com/album/hologram-plaza)

A Brief History of Vaporwave -
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdpP0mXOlWM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdpP0mXOlWM)

------
ENTP
Nostalgia isn't what it used to be!

------
dkuebric
Are selfies and jazzed-up status updates really part of the nostalgia
phenomenon?

I think status updates and other posts are actually motivated by reward
seeking: the approval/admiration of others via likes etc. Therefore a photo in
the moment is not a nostalgic attempt to capture the present but rather a
judgment that the experience itself is less valuable than the social reward
that can be gained by sharing it.

Selfies are interesting; I think they are slightly related to the mass
availability of media. However I don't think it's exactly as the author
suggests. Rather, the problem here is that everyone has seen a picture of
Niagara. So a selfie is a way of personalizing (and thus making, in a way,
exclusive) a well-documented experience.

------
pjlegato
How do we recreate or find a society of people who have technology, but are
not obsessed with pre-remembering things? People who still enjoy where they
actually are, rather than trying to edit and document everything for posterity
as it happens?

Could there be special device-free venues -- bars, coffeshops, and so on where
people go there to actually talk with people around them, where headphones and
tiny screens are not allowed?

How do we fix this?

~~~
SuperPaintMan
Wire up the walls to create a Faraday Cage?

~~~
pjlegato
How do you get enough people to want to go into the giant Faraday cage event
space to make it economically viable to operate?

~~~
SuperPaintMan
Trial it in the gallery space?

