#publisher Technology RSS feed Internet RSS feed Digital Britain RSS feed Instagram RSS feed Twitter RSS feed Nintendo RSS feed Media RSS feed Digital media RSS feed Blogging RSS feed Society RSS feed Young people RSS feed Comment is free RSS feed Turn autoplay off Turn autoplay on Please activate cookies in order to turn autoplay off * Jump to content [s] * Jump to comments [c] * Jump to site navigation [0] * Jump to search [4] * Terms and conditions [8] Edition: UK US AU * Your activity * Email subscriptions * Account details * Linked services * Sign out Profile Beta About us * About us, * Contact us * Press office * Guardian Print Centre * Guardian readers' editor * Observer readers' editor * Terms of service * Privacy policy * Advertising guide * Digital archive * Digital edition * Guardian Weekly * Buy Guardian and Observer photos Today's paper * Main section * Comment * Sport * New Review * Magazine * Observer Tech Monthly * Observer Food Monthly Subscribe The Guardian home ____________________ Search * News * Sport * Comment * Culture * Business * Money * Life & style * Travel * Environment * Tech * TV * Video * Dating * Offers * Jobs * Comment is free How the digital age turbocharged nostalgia It may seem funny how quickly the generation that grew up online starts to reminisce. But taking stock of how things have changed is no longer about a quiet yearning * Share * Tweet this * * [pin_it_button.png] * * Email * Holly Baxter * + Holly Baxter + + theguardian.com, Wednesday 30 October 2013 17.38 GMT * Jump to comments (…) Gameboy device with Tetris 'There's widespread excitement about the just-announced 2014 Digital Revolution exhibition at the Barbican, which is due to showcase Gameboy, Tetris and MacPaint devices to a 90s kid’s heart’s content.' Photograph: Graeme Robertson Nostalgia is a funny thing in the digital age. Take Throwback Thursday, beloved of the generation known as millennials (people who were children in the year 2000). Throwback Thursday is a Twitter and Instagram phenomenon in which 25-year-olds post pictures of themselves at 20 and loudly philosophise about how and why everything has changed since those halcyon days. To which you'd be perfectly within your rights to reply: hey sunshine, this is not visual proof of your patriotic contributions during the great war, this is Warwick University's freshers' week in 2008. And yet if you did say that, you'd be missing a trick. Because nostalgia is a completely different beast to generations who have grown up documenting their lives online. It is no longer an internal emotion or a quiet yearning for what has passed. Instead, it is a deafening roar of collective online voices about how far we've come, how we can present that progress, and how our teenage identities on MySpace can be reconciled with our twentysomething personas on Facebook. Such behaviour shouldn't be too surprising in a cohort of people who actually buy assorted "vintage" hand-me-downs for more than new clothes. But things really do move lightning-fast in the digi-world, so why shouldn't we become nostalgic in a timeframe that might otherwise seem ridiculously premature? Remember the man who bought $27 worth of bitcoins in 2009, forgot about them for a while, and recently found out that they're now worth $886k? (OK, the story only broke yesterday, but bear with me while I reminisce). His windfall is testament to how digi-time is monumentally different to real time. If you need further illustration of this, then look no further than the widespread excitement about the just announced 2014 Digital Revolution exhibition at the Barbican in London, which is due to showcase Gameboy, Tetris and MacPaint devices (no word yet on whether side ponytails and Jumanji T-shirts are compulsory for entry). The show promises young adults, hyped up on Sega Sonic, earnestly discussing how you couldn't use the phone while you were on the internet in the good old days. Like Digital Archaeology, a similar exhibition that was developed as part of Internet Week Europe 2010 (yes, really) and showcased "a selection of the most significant sites of our time", it draws attention to how far we've come in a short space of time. The internet is still very young, yet we can already fill galleries with its many different incarnations. There are more reasons to be nostalgic about the digi-world beyond fond conversations about nights spent on MSN Messenger. For instance, the surge of technological creativity that accompanied the opening of the App Store and a supposed new age of internet democracy is worth being nostalgic about. In the last couple of years (decades in Apple-speak), the platform has instead been awash with refinements of existing APIs, put together with very little innovation. By remembering our initial enthusiasm for such new forms, perhaps we can reignite those fires of inspiration. Willard Foxton argued recently in the Telegraph, that there was no point in teaching children how to code because it's an "extra difficult, boring subject" with few applications. Foxton is wrong, of course; the point of teaching coding is not just to develop a useful amount of future computer programmers, but to give children the tools to be creative in the digital world. Creative coding is as nuanced an outlet as any other form of expression and has the potential to entirely reshape the cyberworld as we know it, once again. So long as nostalgia drives us forward as well as making us glance back, then it can be a powerful force. And if we don't teach our kids about that, then we won't have anything to feel nostalgic about in three years' time. Daily Email close Sign up for the Guardian Today Our editors' picks for the day's top news and commentary delivered to your inbox each morning. Sign up for the daily email * Print this Print this * Share * Contact us Send to a friend Close this popup Sender's name ____________________ Recipient's email address ____________________ Send Your IP address will be logged Share Close this popup Short link for this page: http://gu.com/p/3kxnp * StumbleUpon * reddit * Tumblr * Digg * LinkedIn * del.icio.us * Facebook * Twitter Contact us Close this popup * Report errors or inaccuracies: userhelp@theguardian.com * Letters for publication should be sent to: guardian.letters@theguardian.com * If you need help using the site: userhelp@theguardian.com * Call the main Guardian and Observer switchboard: +44 (0)20 3353 2000 * + Advertising guide + License/buy our content Article history About this article Close this popup How the digital age turbocharged nostalgia | Holly Baxter This article was published on the Guardian website at 17.38 GMT on Wednesday 30 October 2013. It was last modified at 08.20 BST on Thursday 22 May 2014. Technology * Internet · * Digital Britain · * Instagram · * Twitter · * Nintendo Media * Digital media · * Blogging Society * Young people More from Comment is free on Technology * Internet · * Digital Britain · * Instagram · * Twitter · * Nintendo Media * Digital media · * Blogging Society * Young people * Share * Tweet this * * * Email Comments Click here to join the discussion. We can't load the discussion on theguardian.com because you don't have JavaScript enabled. Today's best video * Agony Aunt ep1 orgasm illustration I'm 58 and I've never had an orgasm Psychotherapist and agony aunt Philippa Perry responds to a woman who is suffering from anorgasmia and doesn't want to resort to faking it * 140x84 trailpic for Why Bruce Cleveland 1978 album you should hear this week -video One album to hear this week Michael Hann recommends Bruce Springsteen's The Agora, Cleveland 1978, a widely bootlegged live album * 140x84 trailpic for The Guardian Film Show: Ex_Machina, The Gambler, Mortdecai and A Most Violent Year - video reviews The Guardian film show Our critics review Ex Machina, The Gambler, Mortdecai and A Most Violent Year * 140x84 trailpic for Eric Cantona's kung-fu kick Brick-by-brick - video Eric Cantona's kung-fu kick – brick-by-brick Animated reimagining of 1995 set-to with Crystal Palace fan Soulmates The Guardian's online dating site * GinFizzHuntress, 27 * stephenwatershed, 51 Meet someone worth meeting * I am a[Man__] * Seeking[Women______] * Aged[25] to [45] * In[United Kingdom______________________________] * Within[20 miles_] * Of ____________________ (BUTTON) Search Guardian Professional * Media Network Media network survey: data usage and privacy top agenda Customers worry about their data and are sharing less, but companies could be doing more to enhance protection * Media Network Treat us with respect: how to become your PR agency’s favourite client Get the best results from your PR, stop treating the client-agency relationship as merely transactional * More from our Media network On Comment is free * Most viewed * Latest Last 24 hours 1. [crop_KP-72414_140.jpeg] 1. Someone stole naked pictures of me. This is what I did about it – video 2. 2. Is women's visible pubic hair really so shocking that it must be censored? | Jessica Valenti 3. 3. If you don’t understand how people fall into poverty, you’re probably a sociopath | Lucy Mangan 4. 4. Every new restaurant serves the same 'unique' dishes as every other place 5. 5. Why love is hard to find in the bright lights of the city | Nell Frizzell 6. More most viewed Last 24 hours 1. [968141b1-26bc-404e-b81a-6799a951b5aa-140x84.jpeg] 1. Chilcot: the sleep of reason produces monsters 2. 2. Corporate sponsorship is everywhere so why see red over Coca-Cola? |David Mitchell 3. 3. Britain’s welcome for Mexican president is worrying 4. 4. The Tudors live on – thanks to Henry VIII’s lavish spending 5. 5. The ballad of Broon and sonsie Jim:… by Robert Burns? | Kevin McKenna 6. All today's stories Guardian Bookshop This week's bestsellers 1. Guantanamo Diary 1. Guantanamo Diary by Mohamedou Ould Slahi £15.00 2. 2. Exposures by Jane Bown £7.50 3. 3. Cameron's Coup by Polly Toynbee £7.99 4. 4. Organized Mind by Daniel Levitin £16.00 5. 5. Getting by by Lisa McKenzie £14.99 Search the Guardian bookshop ____________________ (BUTTON) Search comment is free… Latest posts * 24min ago Chilcot: the sleep of reason produces monsters Chris Riddell (with apologies to Goya) on the delayed Chilcot report * David Mitchell 24min ago Corporate sponsorship is everywhere so why see red over Coca-Cola? David Mitchell: The London Eye’s deal with the US dissolved-sugar giant adds another touch of ugliness to modern Britain – but isn’t it a little late to start complaining? Comment from the paper * Hala Al-Dosari: King Abdullah’s gone, but the Saudi monarchy’s pact with the mosques remains * Martin Rowson: Martin Rowson on the death of King Abdullah – cartoon * Christie Watson: If I were queen for a day, this would be a month of real food, not detoxers’ nauseous green slime Sponsored feature guardian jobs Find the latest jobs in your sector: * Arts & heritage * Charities * Education * Environment * Government * Graduate * Health * Marketing & PR * Media * Sales * Senior executive * Social care Browse all jobs ____________________ Search Today in pictures * sports peronality 2012 BBC Sports Personality of the Year – in pictures Bradley Wiggins capped his remarkable sporting year by taking home the big prize at the ceremony in London * Martin Parr's M Video Christmas party photograph Dinner, dusk and dancing Russians: my best winter shot A glass of wine with a rough sleeper, Santa in trunks, a thousand partying Muscovites … in a My Best Shot special, top photographers pick the image that sums up winter for them * Kimon, a long-tailed monkey grooms a kitten, whom, she treats as her baby, Bintan Island, Indonesia Monkey adopts kitten – in pictures Kimon, an eight-year-old pet female long-tailed monkey, treats a kitten as her baby in Bintan Island, Indonesia * License/buy our content | * Privacy policy | * Terms & conditions | * Advertising guide | * Accessibility | * A-Z index | * Inside the Guardian blog | * About us | * Work for us | * Join our dating site today * © 2015 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. * Share * Tweet this * *