I also posted this on my wall
November 10, 2010 10:55 PM   Subscribe

 
I only watched about half but found myself annoyed by the guy
posted by delmoi at 10:57 PM on November 10, 2010


I only watched about half but found myself annoyed by the guy

You should have watched whole thing
posted by katerschluck at 11:01 PM on November 10, 2010


Cute. Reminds me of the "Search Stories" videos Google did awhile back.
posted by Rhaomi at 11:04 PM on November 10, 2010 [1 favorite]


Interesting, well done. The whole idea of our lives being recorded and cataloged via facebook is a little scary for me and this does nothing to curb those fears.
posted by Felex at 11:08 PM on November 10, 2010 [1 favorite]


That was really sweet, it made me tear up in the second half. :)
posted by Jacqueline at 11:12 PM on November 10, 2010


Hm, I liked it. But I also found it depressing somehow.
posted by the other side at 11:25 PM on November 10, 2010


A life on metafilter?
posted by iamck at 11:39 PM on November 10, 2010 [1 favorite]


He sure went to Vegas a lot.
posted by yellowbinder at 11:51 PM on November 10, 2010 [9 favorites]


Taft, I'm just curious...why did you put a "depressing" tag on this post?
posted by iamkimiam at 12:11 AM on November 11, 2010


then in his old age Facebook is turned off and his entire life's records vanish in an instant.
posted by russmaxdesign at 12:12 AM on November 11, 2010 [2 favorites]


then in his old age Facebook is turned off and his entire life's records vanish in an instant his life's records turn into a constant stream of Farmville updates.
posted by katillathehun at 12:53 AM on November 11, 2010 [2 favorites]


Diana or Helene? Drove me crazy every time. Which is it? DIANE OR HELENE?
posted by bunglin jones at 1:28 AM on November 11, 2010 [10 favorites]


Yawn. Huge yawn (pass it on)
posted by 0bvious at 1:39 AM on November 11, 2010


I hate facebook but I thought that was brilliant and awesome.
posted by marble at 1:43 AM on November 11, 2010


Brilliant!
posted by rmmcclay at 1:47 AM on November 11, 2010


It somehow a bit less than brilliant, but sort of interesting. I can't help but think about the logical extention of social media, and its effect on future historians and archaeologists, and then how awesome it would be if people actually posted relevant events from their lives instead of Farmville updates, and then I understood Taft's 'depressing' tag.
posted by sfts2 at 2:33 AM on November 11, 2010 [1 favorite]


I think it has a bit of poetry about it -
"Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more; it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing..."
posted by honey-barbara at 3:24 AM on November 11, 2010 [1 favorite]


sloppy.
posted by the cuban at 3:44 AM on November 11, 2010


He could have gone further with this. What about all the endless post-marriage flirting with strangers, the inevitable break-up and the post-divorce de-friending and re-friending ritual?
posted by skylar at 3:46 AM on November 11, 2010 [1 favorite]


Excellent! Loved it.
posted by JtJ at 4:02 AM on November 11, 2010


Yes, I'm with skylar -- he dropped the narrative too soon. But compelling for a while. Also, nice use of tired song, gave it new life.
posted by thinkpiece at 4:24 AM on November 11, 2010


Unconstructive criticism filter: I wasn't overly impressed to be honest. Drawn out, not very interesting, couldn't care less about the guy. Good premise, but the simpsons google already did it cleaner, snappier, more succinctly and with more emotion.
posted by spr at 5:49 AM on November 11, 2010 [1 favorite]


i thought it was great- very meta- on metafilter (which i have accidentally typed as 'metalife' twice already) then meta-posted on fb!
posted by bquarters at 5:53 AM on November 11, 2010


I was thinking about how we're in an age when a biographer's work is going to become awesomely complicated, as will an archiver's. If you're somebody pretty significant, you no longer leave behind a body of work and a thousand or so letter and maybe a bunch of journals. You leave behind communications on discussion boards, massive numbers of emails, chats, tweets, status updates, YouTube videos, Flickr photographs, and probably sex videos uploaded to the web, if you're any fun at all. It's a wealth of information, but also an awful lot of noise that the imaginery biographer must sort through to find the signal. What might have been a year's work in the last century will one day be a decade's worth of material. We just so extensively document ourselves, without evening thinking about it.

Actually, I was thinking about my future biographer. He's going to enjoy those sex tapes, at least.
posted by Astro Zombie at 5:53 AM on November 11, 2010 [1 favorite]


Yet further reason why one should not trumpet every two-week "relationship" on social media...that broken-heart icon is today's scarlet A.

Also, flagged as "Why do the French love Jim Morrison so much?"
posted by kittyprecious at 6:02 AM on November 11, 2010 [1 favorite]


That's why I periodically set my status to "elected prez again, fuck yeah!" . In the history books it will list me as 54th,67th,72nd and 95th president.
posted by Ad hominem at 6:32 AM on November 11, 2010 [1 favorite]


Wow, this guy was not affected by the Great Recession. :)

Bit of a crank here, but nice concept but poorly executed, could have included so much more than breakups and then the lapses photos till his family.

Does he have to pay rights to air that song? If so, that means money was spent on this "art" and that's sad, because if a high school junior came up with it by herself or himself, then it would have been pretty good.
posted by skepticallypleased at 6:52 AM on November 11, 2010


Interesting.. although "Paint it Black" gave it a feeling that would have been much different with a different sound track.

Well done...
posted by HuronBob at 6:59 AM on November 11, 2010


I liked it, and I second iamkimiam's question: why the "depressing" tag?

> Also, flagged as "Why do the French love Jim Morrison so much?"

Jim Morrison??
posted by languagehat at 7:02 AM on November 11, 2010 [1 favorite]


Who knew Lorem Ipsum was so seductive?
posted by Missiles K. Monster at 7:11 AM on November 11, 2010 [2 favorites]


...okay, whoops.

but the Doors did cover it!
posted by kittyprecious at 7:27 AM on November 11, 2010


This isn't a life on facebook --- like everyone else's facebook profile, it's carefully chosen details of an adulthood on facebook. I am interested in how things will be for the babies like Alex's who begin their public-life-on-facebook without knowing it, and who have an online presence from cradle to grave.
posted by headnsouth at 7:34 AM on November 11, 2010 [4 favorites]


I really liked this. Was prepared to hate it, but in the end felt it was touchingly human and encapsulated a "normal" life. Would have liked to see his children involved more. Him trying to friend his children and them refusing the request. That sort of stuff.
posted by seanyboy at 7:44 AM on November 11, 2010


I liked that!
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 7:49 AM on November 11, 2010


Alex Droner is more of a slut than I thought.
posted by blucevalo at 8:32 AM on November 11, 2010


Facebook's design will be remarkably static over the next sixty years or so.
posted by interrobang at 9:36 AM on November 11, 2010 [2 favorites]


Wait how did he avoid being absorbed into the singularity?
posted by humanfont at 9:58 AM on November 11, 2010


That was really good.
But also what the other side said.

Perhaps because it showed such rise/fall rise/fall in such a short time, when in real life things take so much time, to consider that there is so much life lived in between those snapshots we saw here. Maybe it is depressing to people who extrapolate from the evidence that we were presented with here, into the huge array of possible "scenes" that actually went on behind the scenes, so to speak. Like when we were presented with an unhappy smiley in a quick-cut, to consider the hours, days, months and even seconds in between, and before and after each presented element.

What is that old quote again? "Life is what happens in between status updates"? Was that it?
posted by infinite intimation at 10:14 AM on November 11, 2010


Facebook's design will be remarkably static over the next sixty years or so.

I too found it incredibly improbably that any single design element would be in the same place for more than a period of two weeks.
posted by shakespeherian at 10:18 AM on November 11, 2010


> I was thinking about how we're in an age when a biographer's work is going to become awesomely complicated...

1994: The Collected Letters of W.B. Yeats, 1901-1904

2044: The Collected Tweets of Chad Ochocinco, Vol. XXVI: May - June 2010
posted by The Card Cheat at 10:24 AM on November 11, 2010 [5 favorites]


Isn't that the whole appeal of FB? The continuity of appearance.

Doesn't matter if you are Van Gogh Two, or Sarah Palin, the page looks the same; no need for all that glittery customizable cruft ala myspace. It eliminates the 'social anxiety' around being seen as having BAD! design (I am not arguing that this is 'good' for creativity, or the arts... but that this is possibly what an optimal digital social networking system for the many looks like).

It's brand continuity, or product similarity, the "Applebees theory of food" idea... anyway that may be why it became so popular, definitely, many are right, FB could well be gone within the decade (or not).
The Card Cheat: Web 2-Point-Poetry.
posted by infinite intimation at 10:28 AM on November 11, 2010


Depressing.
posted by nicolin at 11:22 AM on November 11, 2010


depressing. now I want to throw up.
posted by special-k at 11:46 AM on November 11, 2010


how awesome it would be if people actually posted relevant events from their lives instead of Farmville updates

This is happening on Facebook right now, well, maybe not relelvant to *their* lives but I only pay attention to people who post things relevant to *my* life. It's pretty easy if you just hide everyone who posts crap and/or hide all the applications.

I think maybe what people are finding "depressing" is the conventional definition of "life," i.e. find a mate, get married, have kids, die.

That's not so depressing to me. The first three steps are optional, but the last isn't.

Jim Morrison??

Heh, I didn't listen to the sound, so this totally confused me.

"Yeah, it's Jim Morrison, what do you mean? (Waitaminute, it's it really John Morrison? James Morrison? Jason Morrison ...? Oh, right ...")

This isn't a life on facebook --- like everyone else's facebook profile, it's carefully chosen details of an adulthood on facebook.

Right. I've always claimed critical mass will kill Facebook in the end.

We all have different personas. Facebook's popularity (if you friend everyone you know who's on it), means that we all have to distill our personas down until one that is acceptable to everyone ... which is our most fucking boring persona of all.
posted by mrgrimm at 1:35 PM on November 11, 2010


I'll be surprised if Facebook is around in the same capacity as it is today in 10 years. Look at the rise and fall of MySpace; it's fickle out there.
posted by Menthol at 3:36 AM on November 12, 2010


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