The Horrible Future of Social
I see this every time I go to Disney World (I live nearby).  It's almost impossible to enjoy a single ride or fireworks show without a ton of people videoing the whole thing or taking horrible pictures of it with a smart device of some sort.  Rather than enjoying it and capturing some deep memory of a moment with their family, they have their face stuck in a digital device capturing a crude facsimile of the experience that they will likely never look at ever again.<p>I will never forget when a dad was trying to get a good shot of Cinderella Castle and <i>totally</i> missed out on their daughter meeting a princess (I think Tiana from Princess and the Frog was walking over to her character spot or something) for the first time.  Hugely important moment for his daughter completely and utterly squandered in chasing this lifecasted copy of life.  She was excitedly jumping up and down and waving to and got a big hug from the princess, and her dad was swatting her off at first, then completely ignoring her.<p>I've lived here (Orlando) for two years and it's only getting worse.   I've almost given up on being able to ride Pirates of the Carribbean and being able to experience it the way the Imagineers wanted you to.  The constant flash and glowing screens from people posting pictures of the Jack Sparrow animatronic on Facebook completely ruin it.  Fireworks are an exercise in frustration as some joker always sticks his iPad in the air to try to capture a picture.  When the first one looks terrible (as they all do), he tries over and over and over.  By the time he's frustrated enough that he's not getting good pictures, the show is over and he's just missed the whole thing.<p>It's depressing to think how many other experiences people are cheapening and/or missing out on simply because they feel some weird compulsion to SHARE the experience with others rather than LIVE it.