Absolutely true, of course. You don't take pictures of the disasters, you take pictures of the stuff you feel good about, that you want to remember. This reinf

Absolutely true, of course. You don't take pictures of the disasters, you take pictures of the stuff you feel good about, that you want to remember. This reinforces the existing "golden glow of nostalgia" tendency. But has that ever been different in photography? A mind game that I sometimes play: Think of a particularly pleasant "golden glow of nostalgia" memory (or set of photos), and then fill it in with surrounding detail. Not stuff that you remember exactly but context. The boring or even annoying stuff. What if that were recorded too? Why, then browsing around in old recordings would be no more interesting than leading one's current life. Nostalgia, whether in the mind or in recorded media, filters down to the "worth remembering" highlights for a reason.