I’ve never really cooked -- well, anything edible that wouldn’t give my diners food poisoning. The first time I ever tried cooking pasta, I dumped a pound of pasta with some water (without boiling the water first) and left it on the stove for almost an hour. Besides almost causing a mushroom cloud in the kitchen, the pasta didn’t taste too good.
People often find this very ironic, considering I’m Italian, and my father has owned a restaurant for more years than I’ve been alive. Everyone in my family can cook: my parents, grandparents, brother, and even my younger cousins who are still in middle school.
I guess I always somewhat felt left out, like I couldn’t relate to them on some superficial level by exchanging recipes or sharing their culinary secrets. Obviously, this is my family, so it really never mattered if I could cook, or not, to fit in. But, for some odd reason, I constantly felt like an outsider, especially in a room full of Italians who pride themselves in their homemade fare, which stems from generations and centuries of tradition.
Well, sick of wilted, frozen vegetables; watery, mushy, microwaved pasta; and this outsider feeling, I decided I’d get the courage to combat upscale cuisine in the kitchen.
Now, what does this have to do with “Here Comes Everybody”?
According to Clay Shirky, new social tools and the Internet encourage and open group conversation. With cheaper and more easily accessible online and technological tools, groups can assemble from all around the country and world without the limits of time and cost. The Internet and other technology have allowed niches of people to organize themselves and make things happen that could have never happened before. Shirky maintains that there has been a developing transition from hierarchical, highly-organized associations to informal partnerships supported by social networking resources.
“Ridiculously easy group-forming matters because the desire to be part of a group that shares, cooperates, or acts in concert is a basic human instinct that has always been constrained by transaction costs. Now that group-forming has gone from hard to ridiculously easy, we are seeing an explosion of experiments with new groups and new kinds of groups,” (54).
Yes, being a part of a group is a “basic human instinct.” And, the Internet has facilitated and helped fulfill that innate, human desire to be a part of something bigger. I know that I am a part of my family for many reasons, but by cooking, I hoped to establish another connection and network bringing more people closer together, including my neighbors and friends. Besides engaging my family in my journey, I also hoped to involve others as well.
Thanks to a simple recipe from foodnetwork.com (macaroni and cheese), a fully functioning kitchen and appliances, and relatively inexpensive ingredients, preparing a palatable plate didn’t seem so entirely daunting.
In total, my ingredients cost less than $20. Already, I was feeling confident in my choice because if I messed this one up, like my first attempt with pasta, then at least I didn’t go bankrupt in the process. The cheap, easy-to-find ingredients motivated me in my quest to share more commonalities and partake in my family’s “group” of expert, experienced chefs. Like my readily available ingredients from Wegman’s, easily accessible online tools allow people to find and establish their groups on the web. More people from different backgrounds and walks of life can now participate in online groups, leading to not only new groups, but a lot of new groups and more kinds of groups.
And finally the actual cooking began. I boiled the water, put in the pasta, melted some butter, and combined the cheese and milk. After incorporating my ingredients and baking for a few minutes, I was extremely shocked not only to see my finished product didn’t burn down the kitchen and send the firefighters breaking down our front door, but that it actually looked delicious. I couldn’t believe how easy it was for me to transform from a just a consumer to a producer as well. Advanced technology is breaking down barriers for me to learn to cook and for people to correspond and connect with each other via the Internet.
Just like building an organization is much easier and efficient when its members can instantly access a website or communicate with each other through e-mail, so too is cooking when presented with the right tools and ingredients. And the result, establishing and fulfilling this basic human instinct, is more easily accomplished with the appropriate devices, whether it be a whisk or e-mail. Each situation requires different means to carry out its purpose. Cooking did for me what the Internet has done for groups all around the world and all around the clock. It instantly brought them together and filled their natural desire to create human connections with others.
After sharing my experience with parents, they instantly began sharing when and how they learned to cook. I no longer felt like a dependent because we were breaking down our once hierarchical system in which my parents filled their roles as executive chefs, my brother as the sous chef and me as the diner. But now, thanks to technology and the Internet, this new chain of command is slowly blurring and interacting with other levels. There is no one solitary elite, we now all share and collaborate.
And now, my friends, neighbors and friends of friends have been inspired by my simple dish that they too are starting to cook. I’ve reached out to others and shared with them my experience, encouraging them to try something different and out of their complacency.
“Here Comes Everybody” is more than using the Internet to connect with people, it’s about people wanting to connect with people and using the means available to them in order to do so. Yes, the Internet did help me learn to cook (my easy-to-follow recipe), but I went on the Internet on my own accord in order to establish another connection with my family, friends and strangers. Most people want to belong to something, and the Internet is just a relatively inexpensive and quick way for people to find their human associations. After all, it’s the people with whom we establish those bonds, not our monitors or cables.
No comments:
Post a Comment