Update! Update! Read all about it (in less than 30 words...?)

This whole twittering, face-booking, constant need for updates and self indulgence generation is really starting to give me a headache. And it’s a little concerning, don't you think?

Sure, it’s terribly exciting to be kept in the know about how horny some person you’ve barely met is, or how many kids one of your classmates from school has successfully popped out since…well school by the looks of it! But, it simply looks to me like yet another sign of the 'dumbing down' of culture.

Even I have fallen subject to the ‘occasional’ (ahem) emotional rant via status updates - it’s an easy place to vent, especially if you can’t (or don’t want to) directly communicate with specific people. But in retrospect, it’s humiliating. No one wants to know how angry I am because things aren’t going MY way. They may be concerned, but they don’t want to know every, single emotion or detail of my life, (or so I‘d expect). And when my passion for writing starts to dwindle, reading becomes a chore and watching the news is pushed aside for Britain’s got talent - well, then you know something is seriously wrong.

This intrigue and need to be 'in the know’ about things such as who on earth ‘Susan Boyle’ is, just so that we can understand half of these 'tweets', is so incessantly strong, that it has almost rendered people’s thirst for actual knowledge and intellect extinct. Now that’s a worry, is it not?

If I was to be pedantic I’d say how wonderful it is that technology has progressed to the point that we can have news updates sent to our brick-sized I-phones/Blackberries instantaneously and keep in touch with our many, well-valued friends and contacts, apparently lost along the way. But let’s face it, how many of us use it to find out what’s going on in Korea or speak to every, single person you’ve ever met since you were born?

Easy, comfort viewing and online ‘in jokes’ with your mates are one thing, but if it further destroys the motivation to learn I might have to give it all up...but then again, I might not get invited to anymore parties...!

PS. If you read past the first sentence - there might be hope for us all yet!