It's 2007, a brand new year full of hope, promise, but most of all life. And I'm posting an entry utilizing a blog tradition started by my friend Dave. As you may already know, I generally like to stick to my own ideas. Though I always love others' ideas, I like to let them stay their ideas and not make them my own. However, fate/coincidence is such that I could not resist this one. In December, I reached my 3,000th comment on my blog. Given that it was a comment from none other than Dave, I thought it would be fun to invite him to take part in his own blog tradition: the guest blog. So without further adieu, I give you Dave.

30 Seconds of Fame

There was a time growing up when I strived to find my 15-minutes of fame. I have yet to come across the singular defining moment, accomplishment, or chance encounter that creates the aura of cause celebre. Over the years, I have found myself on television: Bozo’s Circus (I missed out on being picked for the Grand Prize Game by one kid) and local access in Oregon the result of which is that I’m sure that somewhere my name appears on a file in the FBI archives-—but nothing truly newsworthy.

There are those that have elicited the beginning of fads. I remember the first Streaker, racing through a sporting event. Word spread and so did the cheeks of many a runner. And in one of the few “follower” moments in my life, I too streaked. Erno Rubik created a strange little puzzle, but would anyone remember him or the origin? Not likely. Instead we are left with the legacy of a multi-colored cube.

Fifteen minutes of fame could also be seen as 15 minute of infamy. For a die-hard Cubs fan like me, the name Steve Bartman will endure. But for 99% of America, his name will melt back into the landscape of life; his brief bout with celebrity has passed.

Now, it seems that the length of fame has compressed. Our lives are downloaded, uploaded, and turned into a ZIP file. We text message, instant message, and send our mail electronically. Our phones have become our workstations and our window to the world. Wherever we are, we have the opportunity to take our personal experiences and spread them across the world.

No longer do 15-minutes of fame retain its power. We are now living in the Age of the Soundbite. The standard for fame has been compressed into 30-seconds. Our blogs, our YouTube clips, and our Flickr files offer the world our creativity and humanity. Men, women, and children from school-age to retirees are sharing their lives like no age before us. Lip-synching, dancing, puppet shows, and edited remixes find astronomical viewership in short periods of time.

This page has been viewed 967,566,333 times since 2pm.

It has been such an accomplishment for the World, that we—-you, I, and everyone out there making their mark in the Internet—-are being recognized as TIME's Person of the Year for 2006.

I, for one, will not take this honor sitting down. I will continue to strive for that one self-defining moment of idiocy that catapults me over the 1 million “hit” department.