Two weeks ago, Vaughn Bell wrote a wonderful piece on Slate.com that provided a history of media technology scares. While I won’t go through the many interesting examples (such as the 1883 Sanitarian article that suggests school might be a bad thing for children), I do think there is something more to consider here.

It is true that whether it be Socrates’ concern about the written word, or the advent of the radio, or the sudden explosion of internet social networks, our fears of new media would is almost entirely an over exaggerated expression of unfamiliarity (humans are, after all, mostly afraid of the unknown).

Bell also points out that not all forms of media are completely harmless. For this reason, I do think that we do need some people to question the use of our media technologies, especially as they grow and develop. Sure our fears may cycle around and around, and it probably “won’t be long until they start the cycle anew,” but there’s is a vast difference between our fears about technology, and the technology itself.

Human emotions are for the most part cyclical; any sort of linear direction in the development in human emotion is every so subtle, if existing at all. But technology does move on a linear path, and the more I think about it, media technology is becoming a living and breathing thing, especially when it combines humans, a la Facebook, Twitter, and the dozens of other social media. It is dynamic, ever-changing and constantly moving (see science blogger Mike Orcutt’s post on links as internet “fuel”) and because it has so many composite parts, it is somewhat of an uncontrollable beast.

In other words, the new media technologies of today hardly touch on the simplistic, controlled structure of yesterday’s printing press. The internet has opened a completely new way through which humans share and absorb information, and as it moves on it’s linear course into the future (with the occasional speed bump or track back), it is hard to imagine it won’t come with social consequences.