Immortality and the art of conversation.

Have you ever thought about the fact that you could already be immortal?
In a way most of us who use modern technology are, if you have ever been on television or the radio, ever used a mobile phone or a computer then the odds are that your image or voice will be floating through space forever.
Ok, it will get fainter and weaker the further it goes, but it will go on forever, until one day an alien race picks it up, now at first they may not understand exactly what it means, but eventually either they, or another race, will translate your image or voice in an intelligible piece of data.

What then will they think? Think about the inconsequential drivel most of us churn out in the average phone conversation, all that is drifting through the universe, million upon millions of words saying nothing, nothing at all. The communication mediums that we all have at our fingertips are really wasted on nonsense 99% of the time. Even at work, how much of our time on the phone is spent talking about work? Not a much as you think.

Before radio communication writing letters was the only viable way of getting information information between any people separated by large distances, in those, most of the time, they had to be thought out very carefully as you could not correct a mistake for some time, if you got it wrong it could be weeks before you received a reply and realised your mistake.
With the internet people feel they can put down their thoughts without thinking too much about what they have written or even the effect it might have on others. I have been guilty of this myself once or twice, normally after a few beers.

Now our words are passing out through the outer reaches of space, my first CB transmission is just passing Delta Eridani 29.5 light years away, I wonder just what anyone there would make of my rambling chat about BSA motorbikes?

Every little piece of chat, every bit of gossip, even singing happy birthday down your mobile will be winging its way across space in all directions. One day someone or something may be listening to what you said, or seeing your image on a tv screen, what do you think they will make of it?