I've made the case that the shift of getting broadband speeds through our phones will change WWW from "World Wide Web" to "Whatever, Whenever, Wherever" because if we're into music, video, gaming, gambling, chatting, buying, trading, etc. we'll get access to whatever we want wherever and whenever. Neil Postman's title then comes immediately to mind, what's to stop us from "amusing ourselves to death?" This has been one of my soapboxes for a couple years - especially as it relates to children whom I believe are even more vulnerable than we are (because they know that getting what they want will make then happy ;-).
Now I have to change tact. A couple days ago, I downloaded the new version of Firefox and checked out a few of the extensions. You have to give Stumble Upon a try. Follow the directions on the last link and you'll get a new browser toolbar installed that looks something like this:
Do the registration thing and start clicking on the "Stumble!" button. This little browser extension is like PopUrls, Delicious, MySpace, YouTube, Messenger, etc. rolled into one ridiculously easy and fun interface.
Remember how cool Random URL was in the early days of the Web? Tripping over to some other country with the click of a button, not knowing what you'd come across. Now warp that early experience with the social networking and AJAX applications of Web 2.0.
So I have to revise my use of Postman. We now face a greater threat to actually getting any work or learning done. We could spend the rest of our lives "intriguing ourselves to death."
Let us know what you think. To whet your appetite, here are a couple sites I stumbled upon: Drawtoy and Transparent Screens.
