Pionner Plaque:
Concept: Social Media
With the concept of social media, which is a form of communication in our society, humans can access postings from other humans around our globe. Using social media as a wireless connection throughout the devices in the world that people spread ideas and posts through. Anyone with a device, these days, has some sort of social media. There are multiple platforms to spread information by and most people are active on various platforms. As the aliens in Chiang’s short story might perceive this concept, humans have evolved into using this form of communication more than actual verbal communication. It’s almost like a broadcasting of information in that one person can post something and the whole world has access to it the second it comes online. Every hand-held device or any device connected to a wireless system can access posts through their accounts and people can choose if their information goes public or private for their followers. Followers are other people’s social media accounts who chose to follow another person and their postings. Since the aliens in the story have the anatomy of a 360 figure, using devices and social media that we have might prove to be difficult but not unattainable as they seem to live in a high functioning society. They probably have some sort wireless system in which they can implement applications of social media. With their writing system of Heptapod B, I would assume their postings would be more complicated and allow readers to understand the context with one look at it, versus our posts which take seconds if not minutes to read and comprehend. Their drawing language system would be beneficial for a concept such as social media because they have complicated systems in which they can easily express and spread around their communities with just one picture of their written language. The heptapods seemed to have a thinking that was almost backwards to the humans and, with this concept in mind, I believe that they could grasp and utilize social media to their advantage with little instruction. The way the heptapods communicated not via verbal speech was not given within the short excerpt so I have to suppose they have some sort of online connection within their population. The system of social media is used in human daily life to allow people to see the lives of others and to spread information that may be helpful for others.