In the first stage he moved very rarely, and when he did so he moved with his entire family/clan. People who were left behind were, quite literally, left behind. In this phase a great deal of letter writing centered around family, business trips that seperated one from a spouse for long periods of time, or people whom you had developed a deep connection with whosde company you could no longer enjoy.

In the second phase, starting in the late 19th century and escalating through WW II, families started to relocate in pieces. Sometimes the husband would stay months or even years away from his family in order to be able to work, and send money back to the family along with letters. Also with the increase in war-related diasporas, writing became a way to try to find family members that you had become seperated from. It also became a way to expand a world that found itself starting to think internationally, via such things as “pen pals”.

The third phase I would define as Post WW II until around the mid 80s. Two things happened in this period. One is that non-party-line telephone service became accesible and affordable to almost everyone. The second was as America grew into a corporate structure and racial tensions ebbed, white flight began and the suburbs grew. With this, of course, came the expansion of the middle class. This is our parents generation. They still wrote to friends who had gone seperate ways after college or to family who had married and moved elsewhere, but for the most part people still lived either in a city when they were young and moved to a nearby suburb as they got older, or grew up ina rural area and went looking for owrk in a city when they got older. These were relatively short distances and relatively infrequent moves so letter writing started to become a lost art.

We are now at the tail end of the 4th stage. In this stage the technology center grew and corporations started to move employees off the books, using more contractors and consultings. The result was a generation much more likely to switch jobs, and locations, frequentl;y. This is our generation. Fortunately with thisd change also came the growth of email. Essentially still a letter, but one delivered with near-instant speed. We were all seperated but could choose to contact each other as we wanted. However this was still a manual process. Technology had not caught up with the virtual existance where one defines “home” in terms of people and not places.

Facebook has changed that. We are now entering a new phase, a phase where we can move around constantly – even daily – and still be as aware of each other’s presence as if we were in the next room. You change your status and poof – all your friends know. You have something you want to tell everyone that is long form – write a note and tag people, or start a blog and post it to Facebook. Want to bring friends together in a common spac – start a group. In short, we finally have a virtual space in which to live our virtual existence. For all the talk of technology outpacing society, in many ways this is an example of technology catching up with society.

In short, these communities never went away – someone had just burnt down the rec center. Facebook is our new local rec center, where we can come together to play, introduce people to our neighbors, watch each other’s children grow up, and commiserate when one of us looses someone close to us. It is a wonder.

Viva Facebook!

The internet changed all of that for me. It started with email. All of a sudden I began finding people I hadn’t talked to you in years, and suddenly it was easier to do so. Nobody really wrote personal letters and stuck them in a post office box in our era – that was a vestige of my grandparents’ era… we were too busy. But email made it suddenly possible to reconnect. Facebook took this to a HUGE new level. It was a massive catalyst. I have gotten in touch with hundreds of friends from every stage of my life – literally all the way back to Kindergarten! Talkin’ four decades my friends!! People I NEVER would have hoped to find, given that I live at least 3,000 miles away from most of them now.

Anyway, my point in all of this is that I learned something – the friendships WERE real – they were not accidental. I have had so many friends from the past tell me how much they thought about me in the intervening period – should we call it the Dark Ages? – and truly, I had thought often of them as well. And when we DID reconnect on Facebook, it was like we were friends all over again – like when you go to your high school reunion and see your best friend from 25 years ago and it feels like not a single day has passed. I marvel at Facebook every single day.

I joined it on a lark – I got a call back in ‘07 while at MBA school from a guy interested in having me build him a facebook app and I was like, “A what?” I didn’t take the gig, but I soon was discovering a whole new world.

Back in the ’90’s, Luke used to say that the browser was the killer app – the single thing that revolutionized the world and brought the internet to the masses. As true as that may be, the killer app of the 2000’s is Facebook. No doubt in my mind. It has changed everything. Just look at the 170-some members of the dreamspeak page… I built that on a lark, too, just as an experiment… now look! Look at the pictures of Suzy’s Sweet 16. Read Billy’s weekly letter. Read the refrigerator quotes! Read your tribute to David Nolan! Look at old pictures of Gregor! And then I get a chat request from Louise Forrest, or Dana Collins! Holy crap! We are all back together again!! How would this have ever been possible any other way? I marvel at it every day. I have deep respect for it – Viva Facebook!!!

Your thoughts here are beautiful, Dave. Thanks.

Thanks again for the encouragement.

- David