It's lost its buzz a bit, but this video created as a public service announcement regarding texting while driving is gruesome and powerful. Note: I couldn't find the actual source video on YouTube, but this one looks real enough.
Covered in a NYTimes article, and retweeted zillions of times, the video has far exceed its expected impact and become a serious meme. I think it's pretty obvious that this captures the public imagination largely because it has become such a common site. I've even seen police do it.
But I think that there is another factor here: the messy intersection of car culture, crash culture and short attention span communication. In the United States, we have an obscene love of cars. Arguably that cultural value is one that is spreading like mad (look at the explosion of the auto industry in China.) We also have a crash fetish (see Ballardian.)
Untitled #40 (Freeways) by Catherine Opie
We also keep shortening the touchpoints we have friends, family and colleagues. It's not strange to have SMS sex or text message your kids. It's not odd to shoot off short missives from the BB while hustling from meeting to meeting. Why would we find it crazy to do these things while we are doing something as banal as driving down Hwy 5?
Unfortunately, at the intersection of these, we end up losing too much.
