I am lonely will anyone speak to me
Encyclopedia
"I am lonely will anyone speak to me" is the title of a thread which was posted on the internet forum
Internet forum
An Internet forum, or message board, is an online discussion site where people can hold conversations in the form of posted messages. They differ from chat rooms in that messages are at least temporarily archived...

 of the video codec
Codec
A codec is a device or computer program capable of encoding or decoding a digital data stream or signal. The word codec is a portmanteau of "compressor-decompressor" or, more commonly, "coder-decoder"...

 downloads site Moviecodec.com, and had become "the web's top hangout for lonely folk." The thread began July 14, 2004. It gained media attention and popularity when it became the first hit when the phrase "I am lonely" was entered into the Google
Google
Google Inc. is an American multinational public corporation invested in Internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program...

 search engine
Search engine
A search engine is an information retrieval system designed to help find information stored on a computer system. The search results are usually presented in a list and are commonly called hits. Search engines help to minimize the time required to find information and the amount of information...

 (though it has since dropped). Because of its popularity, it was featured in the magazines Wired
Wired (magazine)
Wired is a full-color monthly American magazine and on-line periodical, published since January 1993, that reports on how new and developing technology affects culture, the economy, and politics...

, Guardian Unlimited
Guardian Unlimited
guardian.co.uk, formerly known as Guardian Unlimited, is a British website owned by the Guardian Media Group. Georgina Henry is the editor...

, and The New Yorker
The New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...

. Bjarne Lundgren, the webmaster of Moviecodec.com, has stated "Like-minded people tend to flock together and, in this case, Google helped in flocking them together on my site," crediting the popularity of the topic to the nature of like-minded people, in this case being the lonely population. Mark Griffiths, a researcher in internet psychology at Britain's Nottingham Trent University
Nottingham Trent University
Nottingham Trent University is a public teaching and research university in Nottingham, United Kingdom. It was founded as a new university in 1992 from the existing Trent Polytechnic , however it can trace its roots back to 1843 with the establishment of the Nottingham Government School of Design...

also addressed this question, stating "There are a lot of lonely people out there. Some people rely heavily on technology and end up treating it as an electronic friend, a sounding board -- just writing it down can make you feel better... That doesn't change their psychological world at that moment, but creating a kinship with like-minded people can help. You're all in this virtual space together." Due to its large community, Bjarne created a new forum entitled A Lonely Life, for the thread's numerous lonely inhabitants to move to. Since then, the thread's activity has died down significantly though it still receives posts on a regular basis. The original thread is now located on Moviecodec.com's branch site, The Lounge Forums.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
x
OK