Texting, traffic, and the world we live in

What kind of technological age do we live in? I'll tell ya.

Yesterday, I got the following text from my brother traveling from Lake Tahoe to Las Vegas:

Hey, get on the Internet and check out traffic on Nevada state road 28 around Lake Tahoe, we are stuck and not moving for 40 minutes.

I live three time zones away and here he was asking me to find out information that was probably within a mile of his location. What a country. I sat and thought about the implications of this. It strikes me strangely odd and strangely empowering. I didn't know what to think. I mean, is this what information culture has reduced (or "evolved" may be another word) us to?

(By the way, as a sidenote, I was relating this to a class this afternoon and they all had the same blank "So?" stare you probably have ... if you're still reading.)

Anyway, here's the kicker: I found out the holdup. A two-car wreck. I texted the info back to him and then he and I spent the next hour or so texting lines from The Big Lebowski to each other. Ain't technology grand?

But what really struck me is that I found the information from a place I didn't really expect. I starfted with all the biggies: Google maps, traffic.com, even the Weather Channel. But they didn't have squat. No, I found out about the wreck and traffic jam from the local newspaper, the North Lake Tahoe Bonanza.

So, here's to you, local newspapers. Even though many outside the industry say your demise in eminent, you are still vital and cover your area better than any other form of media. Now ... if you can only find a way to pay for it!

This is the point where I could launch into a whole diatribe about the power of local newspapers, but I think I'll just ponder this: if there were a television show that captured the flavor of local, small-town news, would it help? I mean, something beyond Bravo's Tabloid Wars, which I loved.

Maybe like an Andy Griffith-meets-Northern Exposure-meets-Woodward and Bernstein-meets-Doc Hollywood ... maybe I've just found my calling. Paul, warm up the camera! Let's work up a pilot.