Digital Dèrive
The start point for my surfing was probably the toughest part of the assignment. I usually scroll back in forth between a few sites every time I’m on my laptop, so I tried to stay away from that right away. Instead, I started on Google and clicked on the Google Doodle of the day. It was honoring Dr. Virginia Apgar’s 109th Birthday. I did not know who she was so I looked at her Wikipedia page to learn about what she did for newborn babies and her overall legacy. Then I went to Google News and scrolled through the news, with no headline really sticking out to me until I reached the Entertainment news and saw that rapper Post Malone got two corresponding tattoos under his eye, which read “Always Tired.” I don’t mind tattoos, but something about the placement of these particular tattoos really freaked me out (I attached a photo of said tattoos). The pain and permanence that goes into tattoos already make me scared to get one, but the sensitive skin under the eyes? It baffled and haunted me.
After I pulled myself out of this article, I went back to Google News and found an article about the upcoming movie “Hereditary” on Vulture, a subset of New York Magazine. I opened up a new tab and looked up a trailer for the movie, which also freaked me out. In the recommended video was a trailer for the film “Serenity” which was a movie I had never heard of with Matthew McConaughey. There are so many times in my daily life where I spiral into movie trailers, just clicking whatever is next recommended that I’ve yet to see. Still, nothing stuck out to me to continue watching them this time.
In the previous tab, I saw a recap of the most recent episode The Handmaid’s Tale, which reminded me that I needed to finish watching the newest episode on Hulu. It’s an intense watch, so I put it on in the background as I looked through the Vulture website. I read an article about the Best Podcasts of 2018, and I got my phone to look them up on Apple Podcasts. With the familiar feeling of my phone in my hand, I broke down and checked the Twitter app. There, I saw the usual mix of news and funny tweets, but from there I couldn’t stop the usual routine my fingers go through from app to app. From Twitter to Instagram to Snapchat, it was the most natural I felt for the whole half hour.
This assignment showed me that it’s pretty hard to scroll without intention, and it maybe isn’t as fun either. Social media on smart phones have made it so much easier to do the surfing that Morozov feels is being lost with Facebook. I felt far more comfortable scrolling without intention through Twitter and Instagram rather than looking on Google for something to pique my interest.
