A sudden thought on what might have been

I was just reading, and commenting on, an article about Rolling Stone magazine closing it's office in San Francisco.

Back when we were active Deadheads, there were any number of amateur newsletters that floated around the parking lots, Dupree's Diamond News is the one I remember best. Started in the mimeograph days, Heads quickly migrated to desktop publishing when it became available. DDN was usually one page, with tour updates and news of interest to the Dead Nation.

Remembering that made me wonder what tours today would have been like if Jerry had lived? Twitter feeds from backstage? (Hell, I can see Phil stopping the show for five minutes to send out a Tweet: "stop chanting, we did 'Box of Rain' last week.") Facebook pages for tour groups? A big part of the Deadhead experience, like a big part of being a SF fan was the social networking aspect. Wer had some of that in the tape traders, but back in the day that required expensive equipment and being in the know. today? I can see the Dead setting up a site like LiveMetallica.com so fans could get and share shows.

Ah, what could have been...