Nobody cares about your cellphone. Nobody.
Social media is a place where people talk about the banalities of their existence, with 99.9 percent of personal posts being nothing more than trivial drivel aimed at entertaining strangers. The other .1 percent is a forum where news is disseminated and discussed (yes, these numbers are accurate. I counted). Most of the 99.9 percent is fairly benign, whimsical and generally not the slightest bit irritating. Discussions about current events advance discourse about issues the world needs to be talking about.
But let's get one thing out of the way before you log back on to your Twitter account: Nobody cares about your phone.
Unless you've been disconnected from all forms of social communication over the past 24 hours, you may have heard that mankind recently experienced its greatest and most frustrating achievement, unleashing a torrent of emotions that have turned even the most stable friend of yours into a quivering puddle of melted Jell-O.
No, we didn't experience the Second Coming. The Cubs didn't win the World Series; the wheel wasn't reinvented as a square, and broccoli still tastes like broccoli, not bacon.
Rather a phone company--wait for it--released a software update.
Twitter, Facebook and seemingly every other form of social communication have all been dominated by people talking about how they want to, are attempting to, have succeeded or even failed at downloading Apple's iOS 7 operating system, each post seemingly a variation on this:
"OMG, my phone is downloading iOS 7!!!""Uggh what the hell, it said it was gonna take 15 minutes at first but then it said 22 then went back down to 12 and then I got all excited but after six minutes it went back up to 18 meanwhile my best friend's iPhone had already updated its software which is so not fair because my phone is WAY cooler than her phone. YAY, IT FINALLY DOWLOADED and it's so shiny and new and "
The sheer volume and clutter of these social updates has been nothing more than an annoyance over the past few days, to the point if you were to filter out all updates about the iOS 7, you'd lose most conversations, save for someone randomly sharing "What the Fox Say" for the 50th time which, let's face it, is still hilarious.
But the iOS 7 is just an operating system. I downloaded it. It hasn't changed my life in any way, shape or form, much as I'm sure it hasn't changed your life in any way, shape or form. My phone still gets the same crappy reception in the Loop it's always gotten. My phone doesn't walk, doesn't talk, doesn't feel feelings.
Downloading iOS 7 isn't something I'm going to remember for the rest of this week, let alone the rest of my life.
So before you press that send button on another tweet or Facebook status about your frustration/admiration/whateveration about iOS 7, maybe step away from the computer and pet a puppy, read a newspaper, smile at a strange-something that will enrich your life or someone else's.
Because nobody cares about your phone.
Want more? Discuss this article and others on RedEye's Facebook page.
Social media is a place where people talk about the banalities of their existence, with 99.9 percent of personal posts being nothing more than trivial drivel aimed at entertaining strangers. The other .1 percent is a forum where news is disseminated and discussed (yes, these numbers are accurate. I counted). Most of the 99.9 percent is fairly benign, whimsical and generally not the slightest bit irritating. Discussions about current events advance discourse about issues the world needs to be talking about.
But let's get one thing out of the way before you log back on to your Twitter account: Nobody cares about your phone.
Unless you've been disconnected from all forms of social communication over the past 24 hours, you may have heard that mankind recently experienced its greatest and most frustrating achievement, unleashing a torrent of emotions that have turned even the most stable friend of yours into a quivering puddle of melted Jell-O.
No, we didn't experience the Second Coming. The Cubs didn't win the World Series; the wheel wasn't reinvented as a square, and broccoli still tastes like broccoli, not bacon.
Rather a phone company--wait for it--released a software update.
Twitter, Facebook and seemingly every other form of social communication have all been dominated by people talking about how they want to, are attempting to, have succeeded or even failed at downloading Apple's iOS 7 operating system, each post seemingly a variation on this:
"OMG, my phone is downloading iOS 7!!!""Uggh what the hell, it said it was gonna take 15 minutes at first but then it said 22 then went back down to 12 and then I got all excited but after six minutes it went back up to 18 meanwhile my best friend's iPhone had already updated its software which is so not fair because my phone is WAY cooler than her phone. YAY, IT FINALLY DOWLOADED and it's so shiny and new and "
The sheer volume and clutter of these social updates has been nothing more than an annoyance over the past few days, to the point if you were to filter out all updates about the iOS 7, you'd lose most conversations, save for someone randomly sharing "What the Fox Say" for the 50th time which, let's face it, is still hilarious.
But the iOS 7 is just an operating system. I downloaded it. It hasn't changed my life in any way, shape or form, much as I'm sure it hasn't changed your life in any way, shape or form. My phone still gets the same crappy reception in the Loop it's always gotten. My phone doesn't walk, doesn't talk, doesn't feel feelings.
Downloading iOS 7 isn't something I'm going to remember for the rest of this week, let alone the rest of my life.
So before you press that send button on another tweet or Facebook status about your frustration/admiration/whateveration about iOS 7, maybe step away from the computer and pet a puppy, read a newspaper, smile at a strange-something that will enrich your life or someone else's.
Because nobody cares about your phone.
Want more? Discuss this article and others on RedEye's Facebook page.