DALLAS, Jan 1, 2010 / FW/ — Coming out of a recession-weary year, it is easy to say good riddance for the first decade of the 21st century. With terror attacks, wars, recession, global warming, Ponzi schemes among others filling the headlines, it is easy to see the glass half empty. Yet, it is really a decade of a glass half full.
Sep 11, 2001 defined the decade. From changing the way we travel to the war in terror that George W. Bush started and Barack Obama is escalating, we can never go back to “open” airports and hassle-free traveling.
Yet, even during the dark hours of Sep 11, heroes emerged. Firefighters and EMTs, whose existence we took for granted for a long time, were finally recognized for the heroic deeds they do daily. We could never bring back those who were lost during Sep 11, but their memories live on among us as their deaths unified a fractured nation as we all became Americans that day.
Wireless and mobile devices changed the way we communicated. If the 1990s was the decade of the internet, the 2000s will be known as the decade that Wi-Fi and smart phones took the whole world by storm. Ten years ago, we cannot imagine shopping or surfing the web on our phones. Now, we have apps and maps for it!
Social networking connected us and the term global village took on a new meaning. With the rise of MySpace, Facebook, Twitter and Flickr, we are able to connect to people from past and present. More often than not, we live in different places, different cities, even different countries or continents, yet we are able to keep our friendships going as we write on each other’s walls.
And perhaps, this might not be important at all in the grand scheme of things, but the 2000s was also the decade that online journalism gained respect while at the same time, the blog became popular! Go figure!
[MARI DAVIS]
