the wave of Web 2.0

I know that technology is the tsunami of the future, and I want to embrace it with open arms, but am wary of getting too much seawater in my lungs, not being able to surface and watching helplessly as the things I care about are swept away into oblivion. In this process I fear losing my humanity and becoming a Borg like in the old Star Trek. I know this may sound ridiculous, but I want to make sure that my life is not dictated by technology, I want to utilize it as a tool, albeit a very powerful, very useful tool. By definition this means sometimes it has to go back in the box. Otherwise what happens when there is a blackout? When our energy sources dry up? If we define web 2.0 as sites which advocate and facilitate open information sharing and streaming, it has enormous application. Blogs are amazingly powerful, as I have found out via this class, and as I mentioned previously I would love to use them in a creative writing class to engage the students in their own realm. If I were an adolescent today I know I would love to blog, to gain the freedom of getting my words and thoughts out of my head alone, but without the fear of judgment, as I would have probably done in anonymously. Facebook, a relatively new addition to the cyberworld, has already infiltrated every pore of our society, and I too, haven fallen prey to its lures. I want to know what my old friends are up to, I especially love the photos (karmic revenge), and the connections that may not have been made otherwise. I read that if Facebook were a country than it would be the 4th largest in the world, simply based on the amount of users. Wow, this would probably be even larger if more people had access to computers and the internet. While I bask in all of this connectedness, I am still hungry for its physicality. While at the Denver Museum, I was informed that classrooms can set up virtual interviews to watch Scientists at work in real time, and even be able to ask them questions and be a part of the process as they make actual discoveries and revelations. I love this, how likely would this scenario be otherwise? An example used was a group of third graders watching as a scientist unearthed a dinosaur bone, which was obviously a torrential hit. This being said, when we got to go back in the collection rooms, I cannot even put into words the emotions that coursed through me when I got to handle a narwhal tusk, spiraled and primitive like a unicorn's horn, so substantial, cold and tangible. I felt like Merlin awed by the beauty of nature and creation. This is the kind of experience that cannot be recreated in the virtual realm, ineffable and heavy. This is what I don't want to get lost.