Future Archaeology

Like so many of my posts, this started as an idea for a Facebook status.

I had been looking through my facebook history for a status that I'd posted a week or so ago. In the process, I discovered pictures I'd been tagged in, videos I'd linked too, conversations I'd had, and status postings that I had forgotten I had written. Facebook is such a day by day (for some hour by hour) event. We forget what we posted on Facebook the same way we forget what we had for dinner yesterday.

But, unlike our dinner, our Facebook history never goes away.

I think that in the future, archaeologists will have to be computer scientists who dig through years worth of old facebook posts and pictures to discover the lives of people of the past.

Won't that be interesting? Imagine what they'll think, reading your comments on people's various walls, your inside jokes that you post via facebook, wondering what on earth a "poke" is, contemplating the different significances of "liking" someones status and generally trying to understand the part of our culture that is Facebook.

I wonder if they'll see the millions of groups protesting the changes Facebook made over the years. I wonder if they'll be able to dig deep enough to find old Facebook somewhere. How many of you remember the days before Facebook? your first status? your first wall post? the names of ALL your facebook friends?

The things we do on the internet we do without thinking. I think it would be fun to see people of the future trying to figure it out. It even goes beyond facebook to your email inbox, your blog, your class websites, EVERYTHING.