{"id":543,"date":"2020-10-14T18:08:03","date_gmt":"2020-10-14T18:08:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/marshallbrain.com\/wordpress\/?page_id=543"},"modified":"2020-10-14T18:09:53","modified_gmt":"2020-10-14T18:09:53","slug":"timecapsule","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/marshallbrain.com\/timecapsule","title":{"rendered":"Marshall Brain’s Time Capsule Video Project"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

by Marshall Brain<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Introduction<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I am not a fanatical genealogist, but I believe that there was a person named George Brain, born in 1784, who is one of my 16 great, great, great grandfathers. If I am not mistaken, he is the person who opened the Brain Lumber Company in Springfield, Ohio. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Here is the question the kids started asking me and I started asking myself: What would a typical day in the life of George Brain have looked like, say in 1820? Imagine him waking up in the morning and going through a normal day. It would probably be very different from a typical day for us. For example, he wakes up and… what would he have done first? What would be his very first act of the day? He didn’t have a toilet in the house (according to this article<\/a>, “Until 1840, indoor plumbing could be found only in the homes of the rich and the better hotels”) so did he walk out in the backyard to the outhouse? He didn’t have a roll of toilet paper (it wasn’t invented until the 1870s<\/a>), so what did he use? When it was time to make breakfast, how did he do it? What did he eat? How much did it cost?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I imagine that if George could have made a video of a typical day, it would be absolutely fascinating to us today. We would be able to see the details of his life and compare them to our modern lives. How did he survive without running water, telephones, central heat and television? Without a car, how did he get around? How did he entertain himself?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now consider this: 200 years from now, our great, great, great grandchildren might have exactly the same thoughts about life in 2010. They will have their fromalagic deemers and their bicolizacted plagistats, and they will wonder, “How did those poor people in 2010 survive?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Therefore, the goal here is to create a video time capsule that accurately portrays what the life of a typical American looks like in 2010. I am creating it with my great, great, great grandchildren in mind, but I think it would be interesting to anyone in 2210.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I imagine that to any American watching this video time capsule in 2010, it all looks completely mundane – so mundane that I doubt anyone except a few relatives will even bother watching. I take a shower, I brush my teeth, the kids play video games and go to a basketball game. It is all perfectly normal and boring to us. Fifty years from now, however, I think that these videos will be pretty interesting. Cars, computers, phones, houses, clothes, food… I imagine it will all be very different in 2050 or 2060. And by 2210, I imagine that our lives in 2010 will look incredibly primitive – like we are cavemen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was able to do most of the filming for parts 1 through 5 over the long New Year weekend. The first two parts went live on YouTube on January 24, 2010. Ultimately, over the course of 2010, I hope that we can get 10 to 20 videos posted so that the time capsule has “critical mass” and paints a reasonably thorough picture of life in America in 2010.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Speaking of YouTube, I am posting the videos on YouTube in kind of the same way a person would put a message in a bottle and throw it in the ocean. Will YouTube even exist in 2210? Will YouTube preserve videos uploaded in 2010? Will anyone know to look for the time capsule? I don’t know. If you are reading this in 2210, then greetings! I guess it worked, and I hope you enjoy opening this time capsule and seeing how we lived 200 years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Parts 1 and 2<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

[Uploaded January 24, 2010]<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The goal of parts 1 and 2 is to explain the time capsule project and then walk though a typical weekend day in America in 2010. Because of YouTube’s 11-minute limit, I had to break it into 2 parts to cover the day. Part 1 handles everything from waking up to eating breakfast:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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