The lighter side of the Internet

So far in this blog I’ve tried to focus on the higher order benefits of Web 2.0 and social media but it’s important to remember that they don’t always have to strive for such lofty goals. Sometimes it’s just as important to share a laugh or marvel at the coincidences of the universe.

Yesterday when I was exploring the world of Twitter chat, I wanted to start off with something easy for my first round. Tweetchat, another Twitter platform that allows users to follow a hashtag in real-time, has an active rooms feature showing current conversations. I passed on #rocketscience and #brainsurgery and decided to try out #dogsoftwitter.

I realized that this was not so much a chat but rather just a live stream of posts from around the world. It wasn’t exactly what I was looking for, but I welcomed the distraction. Then I saw a post that made me do a double take. It was a picture of a dog curled up on a bed, but it looked just like my dog, right down to the collar! We got Harrison at a local animal shelter and had him DNA tested to find out he’s a mix of Labrador, German Shepherd, Alaskan Malamute, Great Pyrenees and Rottweiler! We were expecting him to be about half the size he is...surprise! Anyway, I replied to the original poster and shared a picture of Harry. Turns out he shares a similar pedigree with his Canadian doppelganger.

I started to think about the coincidence of this post. Harry is probably not as unique as I think he is; his genes come from fairly common breeds. But what are the chances that they would be posted to Twitter? And if they were, what are the odds that I would happen to see that post? The Internet was built on the idea of networks and Web 2.0 and social media tools advance that idea by making us aware of the connections we never even knew existed. The Internet is a vast place and you never know what you might find once you start looking!