The intertubes home of author Robert Lanham

Misty Harris quoted me a couple of times in her latest article for Canwest News Service (Canada's AP):

Guitar solos have vanished from the concert scene at the same time millions of gamers are pretending to be a Guitar Hero.

Gym memberships are down while stores can't keep the home exercise game Wii Fit in stock.

Precious hours of real life are being sacrificed to the online universe Second Life, and high-powered marketing campaigns this fall are planned to sell still more virtual fantasy trussed up as reality.

Forget concern over counterfeit goods such as watches and handbags. Increasingly, it's organic human experience that's being knocked off.

"People are just too overwhelmed by all the technologies that exist to be active participants in real life," says Robert Lanham, who has written three books on the idiosyncrasies of contemporary human behaviour.

"When you're microblogging on Tumblr and juggling Twitter, Facebook, and Myspace accounts, who's got time for yoga classes or guitar lessons? Perfecting your Stratocaster licks playing Rock Band is simply less time-consuming than trying to become the next Jimi Hendrix or Eddie Van Halen." [....]

But however convenient or ego-stoking these hi-tech encounters, cultural commentator Lanham says they'll never be as fulfilling or as sexy as the real thing. "Saying, 'Dude, my virtual band totally rocks ... we're playing a gig in my living room tonight' is never going to have the same allure as securing a real gig in an actual rock band," says Lanham. "And it's unlikely the words 'he's such a romantic text-messager, his SMS skills made my knees buckle' have ever been uttered, or sent via SMS for that matter."