Thoughts on thoughts on connecting

I read James Fallows' last NY Times column with interest:

Working at the PC Isn't So Lonely Anymore

IN the beginning, personal computers were for loners. You sat at the desk and stared at the screen. To involve anyone else in what you were doing, you had to pull up an extra chair at that same desk, or carry a printout or floppy disk containing your work to a friend's or a workmate's machine.

Working with computers became interesting, as opposed to merely useful, when it became a social activity. E-mail was the first big step, and the Internet the second. Now, with the BlackBerry and Skype and municipal WiFi and the omnipresent cellphone, it is tempting to think that technology has given us too many ways to stay in touch.

But if the history of communications shows anything, it is that the demand for connectedness is limitless. (And round-the-clock communication makes the occasional disconnected interlude, whether a vacation or a mere two-hour airline flight, all the more precious.) So the most promising tech developments are often those that offer yet another way to satisfy the primeval human urge for contact.

James focuses on a new collaboration application for the Mac, but what interested me was his understanding of the bigger picture – that "primeval human urge" for connection.

I wonder if (or should I say, when?) we'll reach a point where the stereotype of the advanced internet user describes a highly social person, always in the know and interested in conversation, as aware of fashion trends and pop culture as she is of world events and local stories. A person who writes and expresses herself well, who can edit music and video as easily as slicing a pie, who merges the technical/analytical with the creative/intuitive as if she sees no conflict or division between them.

Cool.