I find that things are getting less and less permaneant in these new age. Digital photos can be completely gone if you accidentally delete them. Cyber friends can be made overnight and be completely gone in the next instance, just like ships that pass in the night. After blogging for so many years, I have had cyber readers who come and read each and every post I write, every day, and they have become more friends than strangers and you feel as if you know them personally and so well and then one day ….. poof! they suddenly disappear in a puff of smoke and you never know why. I have gotten used to it by now but it still leaves a little void and make you wonder why? That is the cyber and digital age.
I guard my photos like mad, making copies and copies of copies because I am so afraid of losing them. We hardly make any hard copies and they are all stored digitally on the pc and on discs which may become obsolete over time. My wedding cartridge has become obsolete….. Yes, I got married in the cartridge age when storage was rather big and clumsy. 🙂
E-book, E-cards that get read and discarded almost instantly (though I may save them on the pc at times), photos, friends… everything can be gone in minutes. It is horrible. Ah..yes, another thing. I hosted most of the poems I wrote over the years on the then free Yahoo Geocities which has gone puff up in the smoke too albeit with some warning. The “My Poems” link on my Parenting Times blog are mostly obsolete now or empty links. So sad….
I think I may have saved some of my poems when I got the warning from Geocities. I stashed them and chucked them away somewhere in the deep recesses of my pc somewhere. So I have decided that in the next two weeks, when I shall be too busy to post anything during the school holidays, that is what I will do. I will dig out every poem I wrote and give them a proper home here. Yes, they deserve a better home. Not chucked away in my pc filing cabinet somewhere and definitely before the pc decides to kaput and then I would have lost them forever! That is horrible. I better get to work immediately, even though it will be tedious work, looking for them and republishing them. I must not be lazy and procrastinate. I had better do it before they are all gone………
Thanks for reminding me I need to burn old photos into a cd. I do print the photos out but I haven’t done that for months already. Btw, maybe you can email your cyber friends?
I try not to email a cyber friend first unless they email first (unless there is reason to do so) because I am afraid it may be an intrusion of their privacy. For example, a person who comments on your blog may not necessarily appreciate a private email from you but perhaps I am wrong about that. 😉
Will be waiting to read your poems. ;D
Hope you don’t get bored reading them as I don’t have very much time to post, so I will just post my outdated poems. Haha.
Hi MG,
Friendships are like two hands that clap and it takes continous efforts – as much as if with family members if they are true friedships. On your blog, your postings are your efforts and comments (reciprocations and validations)in a two way communication.
Despite the availability of email/ phones at our finger tips, if no effort is taken to keep in touch with family or friends. You will feel the same “void” too if no one replies.
Oh No! I am the bad one at keeping in touch! 😛
Compared to times when we all write letters or post physical cards for birthdays, etc … one normally get some form of reply despite the time taken to post them. Maybe the “instantenous” feedbacks with such technology makes us feel that we need to get quick feedbacks too versus older forms of communication. It makes us “impatient” too as we keep time to the second :P.
That is true. I am rather impatient. Especially when the computer is slow to load. 🙂
It is good at times to lose track of time so as to enjoy the time in doing the things itself then trying to “complete” it as fast as possible e.g. vacation at a beach is normally very short even if it is a week.
Normally, I backup only important files and data on thumb drives (cheap nowadays) and only print out those that are “critical” for my files. Likewise for photos.
With the advent of the digital camera, we tend to take lots of candid shots that may not be worthwhile printing versus the time when you are restricted to 24 or 36 exposure rolls. So I only print good photos for the albums (if I remember to do so ;))
For your peoms and postings, do print them out and file them. Nothing beats hardcopies for recordkeeping. That way, you can scan these hardcopies and then re-post them again :P.
Oh my, how silly of me. How come I hadn’t thought of that at all? It is only about a dozen or so. It can be easily done in no time. Thank you so much for your suggestion. Unfortunately I don’t have a printer at home….
I’m still reading!
🙂
Oh yah hor….