I enjoyed the premise and execution of “The Truman Show,” the 1998 Jim Carrey film in which an innocent Carrey is the unknowing subject of a 24/7 TV show which an adoring public watches with unabated curiosity.
In the latest version of life imitating art, I woke up with the “Today” show this morning doing a feature on Justin.TV, the brainchild of a San Francisco group of twentysomethings that puts Justin up live up on the web 24/7 for a fascinated group of voyeurs. Technology companies and others are waiting in the wings for the birth of a new expose-your-navel fad to be the next YouTube.
I guess there are marketing possibilities both online and elsewhere (can you imagine a cereal company paying Justin for product placement – why not if he can get on the “Today” show?)
The best thing about this spectacle being on the Internet is that people can decide for themselves whether to watch it. But for me, this sort of spectacle has something distinctly unappealing about it. It is a parody of “reality” TV, which in turn is a parody of real life. It makes me feel a kinship to the Luddites, a social movement which disapprove of advances in technology. To riff on Timothy Leary, it makes me want to tune out, turn off, and, especially, drop out. At this point in my life, a blog is enough public exposure.
