Having reread A Brave New World and been staggered by how accurate the predicted society has become since 1932, I began understanding that today's younger generation, given instant gratification by mobiles, Internet, Twitter, You Tube, video games, is now addicted to SOMA.

Nothing wrong with that, you may think; and I keep moaning at my friend Deniz (81) that he must get online because it is so useful, but there is a massive, subtle downside.

And that is lack of depth. Without the painstaking, boring effort of research (in the old days, walking to a library), we are now so immune to effort that we have lost the ability to appreciate it. And one of the side effects has been on music. Any effort to understand or enjoy or consider depth has gone and been replaced by Instant Gratification.

Tommy (21) looked at the Pieta statue by Michelangelo for two minutes, said "beautiful" and moved on.

JK at 21 stood in front of the statue of David (admittedly much bigger) for 5 hours and almost couldn't tear himself away for admiration and wonder.

So why would anyone want Rachmaninov when they can have Barbara Streisand?

"So why would anyone want Rachmaninov when they can have Barbara Streisand?"

or indeed, Burley Chassis !

you are right. There is little depth to the net. It has opened the world but in some ways, too much. It's like overload and there is sooo much nonsense. Twitter is aptly named. People rabbiting on about nothing.

Everything is like that...total entertainment but little satisfaction. It's like a great big very rich sickly cream cake which after eating you feel unsatisfied. Just full.

I used to love getting photographs from holidays and re-living it all over again. Now it's instant. But is it good ?

Brave New World. 1984..both spot on.