here there and everywhere: what i find on the internet and why you need to care.

Recently, I’ve found myself in the depths of the internet. It all started late one night when I decided to make a tumblr. Then I started discovering the tumblr world. Something I never had a reason to venture into before, I found that it was all a niche. It’s how I found a blog made by a NYC cab driver who posts photos of things he comes across. I also managed to befriend a contributing editor of Pitchfork on tumblr. The community of writers, pro and amateur, who live in the tumblr blogosphere is outstanding. You can find just about anything there.

Tonight I was engrossed in a long interview with Billy Corgan – yes, THAT Billy Corgan. He discusses the state of Alternative Culture and Alternative Music, and how ‘bearded bloggers’ can make you feel about the music you make and share with other people. Where the parts of the whole are certainly larger than the whole of the internet, it got me thinking about all the places the internet has taken me. While I’m almost a full year into my career on twitter, every day I’m finding a new way to use it. I stumbled on a incredibly well written piece about Ariel Pink on a Los Angeles based music blog called Quit Mumbling. Then I found Light In The Attic, a Seattle based record label. But before that, Chunky Glasses responded to a snide comment I made about the Best Coast show at the 930 Club here in DC via twitter. And then after some friendship and emailing, I started writing for them.

The internet is so massive that you will lose sleep trying to find the end. And even with all the loads of crap out there, I can’t complain. Because the internet brings us beautiful things, content, endlessness, and the joy of discovery.

Music lives online. Reality will have you believe that it’s all a hoax. Other people will call you a hipster with a blog. But the fact is – the internet has not only changed how we are and who we are, it has provided a mirror to the physical world. Only you cannot measure it. It is limitless. That is why so many bands exist and continue to pop up. Cities still have music communities, they just live online now.

Before I wrote here, I contributed to a site a college friend started. It existed as a zine print-out at first. Then became a blog and when I recently went to find it, thacant.com was actually gone. Pieces of writing I had linked to and cherished, vanished. Now there is no going back. The internet promises that you can always go back and undo. But you can’t. That is why I’m using this space to encourage you to to start your own blog. I don’t care if you aren’t ‘into’ writing, or if you think you don’t have anything to say. Post photos or your poems. You never know what the world might find from it. Thanks to Aquarium Drunkard, we now have The Orwells. And to those of you who say, ‘the world doesn’t need another blog.’ You’re wrong. The world always needs to hear your voice and ideas. With a free ability to share, even if only one stranger finds you, someone has found you.

So many people live on the internet. No one realizes how easy it is to hide online. They’re all too worried about being found, used, and abused. But you can use it to your advantage. Fun things exist. And over-looked thesis essays live there. Rabbit holes and black holes are all very real. And so is the internet. Have you started your blog yet?