Bus Stop — The Hollies
In the last 50 years, life has got both a lot more random and a lot less random at the same time.
Now, with a few clicks of a mouse you can be chatting with someone on the other side of the world. Because technology means we are no longer restricted by geography, the world is…literally…our oyster.
But technology has been “optimised” and algorithmed to within an inch of its life which means it delivers more of exactly what you say you’re looking for, but at the same time it delivers a lot less of the random happenstance that can make the world a magical place.
On a modern-day dating app, you can decide you’re only interested in people with certain characteristics and interests. Then the algorithm does its work and serves you thousands of possible mates whose interests and characteristics overlap with the ones you seek.
The theory of that sounds fine until you realise that this is a great way to build echo chambers of people just like us. Personally I prefer to spend as little time as possible with people just like me as I already know what I like. I’d much rather spend time with people who are nothing like me because it’s much more likely they’ll take me places and introduce me to experiences I would never had known about and would never have tried on my own.
