4 ms·

And yet, the woods are teeming with hikers and campers, at least in California. I often wonder whether the opportunity to stage your “life” in a beautiful plac

by biztos 4y ago

And yet, the woods are teeming with hikers and campers, at least in California. I often wonder whether the opportunity to stage your “life” in a beautiful place for social media is a part of why so many more people head into the woods than did ten or 20 years ago. I mean, the woods were there the whole time, and arguably the weather was better.

gw99 4y ago
Sort of. I encounter many miserable looking poorly equipped people constantly asking me to take selfies of them posing with a fake smile. I was stopped 7 times on a 50km hike recently. People want to be seen to do it. They don’t appear to be enjoying it though. Edit: ironically considering the article I tend to wear AirPods now because people don’t ask me to do it.
- mercutio2 4y ago
  Pedantic nitpick that doesn’t diminish your point (you don’t like people doing photography and especially involving you in it, in the woods): If they’re asking someone who is not themself to take a photo, the photo in question is, by definition, not a selfie.
  - gw99 4y ago
    One of my hobbies is outdoor photography. I don’t mind people taking actual photos of the outside. The objection is having 75% of the frame taken up by someone repetitively taking photos of the same pose (the good side of their face) while doing an impression of a fish and/or wearing something completely in appropriate that is going to land them in hospital one day from hypothermia. As for the selfie, I’m on the fence on your semantic definition. I consider myself to be a meat flavoured selfie stick when asked. I’m merely a tool that happened to be walking past that is good for pointing their device at a bulbous ass obscuring the scenery.
  - zimpenfish 4y ago
    I think the generally accepted meaning of "selfie" has drifted far enough into including "photos of my(self) taken with my phone at my request" that nitpicking about it has similarly drifted into the "WELL ACHURLY, literally doesn't mean that" school of prescriptivist nonsense.
    - yakubin 4y ago
      That’s the first time I see “selfie” used in that sense. Even descriptively, I don’t think the word means that.
    - mercutio2 4y ago
      I am willing to allow language to shift. But I have literally (in its original meaning!) never heard anyone but gw99 describe “pictures of myself taken by a bystander” as a selfie. I’ve taken a lot of posed photos of tourists with their own cameras, I don’t see why “the camera is now a phone” would make that phenomenon merge with the specific thing people do with the front facing camera. “Me, posed at destination” seems like a wholly distinct phenomenon to me.
      - zimpenfish 4y ago
        > I have literally (in its original meaning!) never heard anyone Well, the wandering nature of the word has been linguistically noted since at least 2014 by my knowledge[1]. Read more linguist blogs, I guess? [1] https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=11205 https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=11205
        mercutio2 4y ago
        Fascinating! I wonder what subcultures of Americans use the word this way.
brudgers 4y ago
Driving to the woods is easier than twenty years ago. Cars are better. Roads are better. And of course, maps are exponentially better. Not only in terms of directions. Discovery is exponentially better. That waterfall that only showed up on the USGS topo map, is now on the map in your pocket...and Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and Twitter. And the Forest Service website.
- kzrdude 4y ago
  I think the computer and information centric lifestyle we have now, and maybe efficient but stressful workplaces, they make it necessary (for some of us) to be very intentional about disconnecting. Hence going into the woods.
- cykros 4y ago
  Never mind how much easier it is to not get lost in the woods thanks to GPS navigation on phones (even outside of service area, if you've had the sense to download the map). That said, you do run into people who head out relying on the phone who run into a hell of a time when it stops working, either due to battery or accidental disruption (ie, it fell in a river). It would be nice to see more folks pick up some basic orienteering skills (it's REALLY not all that hard...I learned in middle school), but either way, more folks getting an appreciation for outdoors I'd call a good thing. Now, if they'd bring some Leave No Trace principles into the woods with them, that'd be great. Seeing how the eternal September played out on Usenet though, that may be a bit overly hopeful on my part.
TrueGeek 4y ago
> I often wonder whether the opportunity to stage your “life” in a beautiful place for social media is a part of why so many more people head into the woods I think so. For me and my friends, we’re not “staging our life”, but a lot of times I’ll see someone post a photo of a trail on Instagram or Strava and I’ll comment asking where it is. We still went out 10 years ago. We still took photos 10 years ago. But now it’s SO much easier to share what the different trails look like and it’s possible to share the exact GPX tracks with each other. It’s a wonderful time to be wandering around in the woods and if someone just got into the hobby yesterday and wants to post the beauty of their quarter mile “hike” more power to them.

by biztos 4y ago

gw99 4y ago

Sort of. I encounter many miserable looking poorly equipped people constantly asking me to take selfies of them posing with a fake smile. I was stopped 7 times on a 50km hike recently. People want to be seen to do it. They don’t appear to be enjoying it though. Edit: ironically considering the article I tend to wear AirPods now because people don’t ask me to do it.

mercutio2 4y ago
Pedantic nitpick that doesn’t diminish your point (you don’t like people doing photography and especially involving you in it, in the woods): If they’re asking someone who is not themself to take a photo, the photo in question is, by definition, not a selfie.
- gw99 4y ago
  One of my hobbies is outdoor photography. I don’t mind people taking actual photos of the outside. The objection is having 75% of the frame taken up by someone repetitively taking photos of the same pose (the good side of their face) while doing an impression of a fish and/or wearing something completely in appropriate that is going to land them in hospital one day from hypothermia. As for the selfie, I’m on the fence on your semantic definition. I consider myself to be a meat flavoured selfie stick when asked. I’m merely a tool that happened to be walking past that is good for pointing their device at a bulbous ass obscuring the scenery.
- zimpenfish 4y ago
  I think the generally accepted meaning of "selfie" has drifted far enough into including "photos of my(self) taken with my phone at my request" that nitpicking about it has similarly drifted into the "WELL ACHURLY, literally doesn't mean that" school of prescriptivist nonsense.
  - yakubin 4y ago
    That’s the first time I see “selfie” used in that sense. Even descriptively, I don’t think the word means that.
  - mercutio2 4y ago
    I am willing to allow language to shift. But I have literally (in its original meaning!) never heard anyone but gw99 describe “pictures of myself taken by a bystander” as a selfie. I’ve taken a lot of posed photos of tourists with their own cameras, I don’t see why “the camera is now a phone” would make that phenomenon merge with the specific thing people do with the front facing camera. “Me, posed at destination” seems like a wholly distinct phenomenon to me.
    - zimpenfish 4y ago
      > I have literally (in its original meaning!) never heard anyone Well, the wandering nature of the word has been linguistically noted since at least 2014 by my knowledge[1]. Read more linguist blogs, I guess? [1] https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=11205 https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=11205
      - mercutio2 4y ago
        Fascinating! I wonder what subcultures of Americans use the word this way.

brudgers 4y ago

Driving to the woods is easier than twenty years ago. Cars are better. Roads are better. And of course, maps are exponentially better. Not only in terms of directions. Discovery is exponentially better. That waterfall that only showed up on the USGS topo map, is now on the map in your pocket...and Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and Twitter. And the Forest Service website.

kzrdude 4y ago
I think the computer and information centric lifestyle we have now, and maybe efficient but stressful workplaces, they make it necessary (for some of us) to be very intentional about disconnecting. Hence going into the woods.
cykros 4y ago
Never mind how much easier it is to not get lost in the woods thanks to GPS navigation on phones (even outside of service area, if you've had the sense to download the map). That said, you do run into people who head out relying on the phone who run into a hell of a time when it stops working, either due to battery or accidental disruption (ie, it fell in a river). It would be nice to see more folks pick up some basic orienteering skills (it's REALLY not all that hard...I learned in middle school), but either way, more folks getting an appreciation for outdoors I'd call a good thing. Now, if they'd bring some Leave No Trace principles into the woods with them, that'd be great. Seeing how the eternal September played out on Usenet though, that may be a bit overly hopeful on my part.

TrueGeek 4y ago

> I often wonder whether the opportunity to stage your “life” in a beautiful place for social media is a part of why so many more people head into the woods I think so. For me and my friends, we’re not “staging our life”, but a lot of times I’ll see someone post a photo of a trail on Instagram or Strava and I’ll comment asking where it is. We still went out 10 years ago. We still took photos 10 years ago. But now it’s SO much easier to share what the different trails look like and it’s possible to share the exact GPX tracks with each other. It’s a wonderful time to be wandering around in the woods and if someone just got into the hobby yesterday and wants to post the beauty of their quarter mile “hike” more power to them.