“IT'S CALLED GOSSIP AND OF COURSE IT'S AN OBSESSION OF MINE -ANDY WARHOL

“Imagine if the current crop of public figures had grown up during the Facebook era. We might have photos of John McCain in Florida slurping body shots off his stripper girlfriend. Barack Obama rolling a joint on a beach in Hawaii. George W. Bush passed out at a Yale frat party, 40-ounce beer bottles duct-taped to his hands. Hillary Rodham Clinton at a Wellesley peace rally, locking lips with her husband's future secretary of labor, Robert Reich. It's one thing to hear that your elected representative had a wild time in college. It's entirely different to have pictorial proof. Would you still vote for someone after viewing a photograph of him passed out in his own vomit? Our generation - high schoolers, college students and recent graduates - immortalizes the interesting and banal, the innocent and incriminating, all on the Internet. We update our Facebook status as often as we change our shoes, and upload party photos before the last reveler goes home. Non-participation is impossible: We file our job applications online and arrange first dates via e-mail. The upshot? America's standards for personal embarrassment, political scandal and appropriate disclosure are sure to change in the years to come.”

-San Jose Mercury News
July 17 2008