Found then Forgotten

            This week (as an assignment) I have been on the quest to find a social bookmarking soulmate. Though explained many times, this title still confuses me and may also confuse you. So, as Wikipedia defines it:

A soulmate (or soul mate) is a person with whom one has a feeling of deep or natural affinity, similarity, love, sex, intimacy, sexuality, spirituality, or compatibility.

Social bookmarking is basically having the ability to share the bookmarks for websites that one has an interest in. This sharing then enables people to find links easily through people they know have similar interests.

So basically I just have to find someone who has an interest in the same stuff that I do, and shares it with the world.

Because much of my writing is on the environment through personal experiences with the addition of photos, my teacher suggested going to Pinterest to find the one. Pinterest. The only association that I have had with pinterest until now has been my girlfriend helping out her friends with wedding ideas. To my surprise though, as I started searching keywords like deforestation and air pollution, interesting things started coming up.

I think I have found that soul mate! But when I say that, I mean I have found one board that one person has pinned on that I actually feel a connection to. So, if my social bookmarking soulmate could be a pinterest board, her name is “Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it”. Though the title could have been cut down a bit and it isn’t all in caps, the images that are posted, by this Ana Trejo person, deal with issues that I am interested in exposing. I did find other people that just had also pinned amazing photos dealing with the destructive events of the world, but my soulmate has also written below each photo, giving background into why this photo is up on their board, as well as hinting at what could be done. Though there isn’t much personal experience going on, and I am starting to get this “My one wish would be world peace...” vibe from this board, it covers issues that are relevant to topics that I discuss in my blog.

Pinterest is a weird thing. So many of the same photos everywhere under different names and boards. I guess that's what re-pinning is. This blog entry may not be the right place to discuss images and the faults that I have found in pinterest, but I can’t help myself from critiquing this way of sharing. It seems to be a web version of Roland Barthes, “Death of the Author” essay. For those who haven’t read it, Barthes basically states that the author is nothing without his/her readers. But, while the readers keep the author relevant they also slowly kill the author. Pinterest is millions of photos with no author. Who took them? What did they have to go through to get that photo? No one cares.

Though I thought I finally found my social bookmarking soulmate, the more I examine pinterest and the way it works, I am already starting to think that it is time to get over her.