reign of the digital ‘A’

i’ve been using computers since i can remember (and perhaps most of you have too). i’ve had an ipod for more than three years (3G) and i’ve used many cellphones throughout the last 7 years or so.

and i have come to realise it pays to be an ‘A’. very much. too much.

in the digital world, if you’re an ‘A’, you’re top of the crowd. you stand out. you made it to the top boy! you’re among the elite that has always the first screen real estate in any list. why? ‘cause digital still means alphabetically arranged for most of them(us).

i think the musical bands i don’t blindly succumb to (and have already printed in my dna) that don’t start with an ‘A’ (or even an ‘F’ for that matter) have less chance to be listened repeatedly by me when i start looking for something new in my alphabetically-organised iPod artists list, just because those are the first i see every single time (and i mean every single time) i browse my ipod. if you’re not an ‘A’ group, then you might have an ‘A’ album, and you bet i’ve seen you a thousand times.

but digital is not that young anymore. we’re 30-something already (the young crowd). so perhaps it is time for digital to start looking for other ways to organise information. spotlight i like, for spotlight cares for ‘M’ as much as for ‘B’. organise my pictures by date i like, so i don’t always get ‘aunt sally’ the first one. put brackets, dots, underscores and asterisks in the beginning of my perferred playlists in iTunes i like, so i can feel i own my music realm, though it also gives me that ruthless, maverick feeling of ‘hacking’ the system. (i don’t necessarily like or do these all, but they all make good examples).

perhaps that is where ‘digital democracy’ should start from.