A
few years ago, when a friend of mine found that she could look up her
name on this new thing called Google, she was delighted. She typed in
her maiden name and up came a list of theater performances she'd been
in as a young woman. "I've won the Google," she proclaimed. She was
making fun of her thin understanding of the technology. Since she's
English and very amusing this sounded sweet and funny and also made a
kind of sideways sense which is the only kind of sense worth having at
times.
I was reminded of this when considering people who can't be bothered to Google the simplest information. I'm not talking about mere ignorance. (If I were, I'd be talking about myself.) We don't have the time to look up every little thing in our lives. I'm talking about active, aggressive ignorance. I'm talking about at least two kinds of people. First, the kinds who form deep opinions about things without even first checking at least Google to see if there's anything to their claims. Second, people who send emails, Twitter messages and place phone calls asking questions that can be answered with a simple Google search. In these two cases, if there were prizes to be given, we'd know what it would mean to Lose the Google.
Related: Let me Google that for you.
Also related: Those who Reckon (via Merlin Mann)
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