What's in a name?

This blog will focus its energies on critiquing the modern world, particularly as technological advances, after brief periods of hype, recede into the background and become the structures, environments, white noise, and scaffolding around us. Its central premise is that we should not take dramatic shifts (or even more subtle ones) in pop culture and communications, mass consumerism and marketing, gadgetry, advancements in engineering and the life sciences, changes in military hardware, and the like for granted. We must open them up and consider how they will direct our futures, and the choices with which we will be left years down the road.

Hence, the name: "hit me up on my Myspace" is a common expression used mostly by those at the lower end of the coveted 18-32 marketing bracket that oft-times replaces the "call me on my cell" of old. In its simplest terms, it means "go to my Myspace page and post a comment." It's not beyond even a freestyle hip-hop artist on 106 & Park on BET to end his victorious rap battle with "hit me up on my Myspace." Hollywood productions have begun to offer Myspace pages instead of (or in addition to) websites in their ads or on their movie posters. And music artists are selling their wares (www.myspace.com/mrbt) or being cajoled into producing a new album after a far-too-long hiatus (www.myspace.com/mcpaulbarman - please go and check out his new single released on Myspace, "Ignorance," and support the man). Blogs, myspace pages, IM chats, etc. - what do they mean for how we relate to each other and address the central challenges that come attached to our humanness (1. we are mortal beings; 2. no matter who we're with, we are essentially alone in that our thoughts are encased in a physical shell separate from all others; and 3. how do we go about creating communities and existing in them, particularly given 1 and 2?). How do they tweak our expectations for how we interact interpersonally and in terms of governance?

I also like the curious results that can follow from having such a blog name. For instance, I read that some insane parents are using their babies' T-shirts to advertise their blogs (see BoingBoing, the best blog on earth at www.boingboing.net). If these miserable excuses for human beings gave their children a shirt advertising my blog, the two lines on the T-shirt would negate each other, vastly curtailing the odds of another person looking up their blog (it would read:

check out my father's blog

hit me up on my myspace

I may be the only person on earth that finds this funny, but Who cares? This is my blog and I'm glad that you're a part of it.

Vaya con Dios - brooding presence

Which one is Brooding Presence? Vote now!

Welcome

Welcome to the best blog ever.

Brooding: "cast in subdued light so as to convey a somewhat threatening atmosphere"

This little slice of cyberspace will hover at the periphery of all that is taken for granted and left unquestioned in our society, casting aloft occasional verbal incendiary devices. Will it send ripples through the blogosphere? Perhaps not. But let's try our best, and have some fun along the way!

My pledge to you, Dear Reader:

1. I will never use my blog to post meaningless "this is how I spent my last three hours" messages.

2. I won't allow random strangers to use my blog to sell "hey I just earned $250 from my living room" schemes or settle old scores with their anonymous rants. Focus on the issues. Otherwise, I say DELETE!

3. From time to time I will post links to sites that address important causes. Click on them and do what you're told.

4. Once readership hovers above a respectable number, I will print T-shirts. T-shirts: Ain't nothin' wrong with that!

5. I will post as often as I have something to say. "Ask me no questions, I'll tell you no lies, but one of these mornings, you'll get a surprise" - The Electric Grandmother (look it up, youngin's!)

Vaya con Dios - brooding presence