2.0 marathon

It's just occurred to me that I've followed this year's London marathon entirely via social media provided by those people running or watching the event.

I know the marathon was yesterday. I don't know who won and don't have any interest. I didn't hear a single piece of pr for it, didn't read a single report or preview, heard nothing on the radio (despite listening to fivelive more than the average person) and didn't watch any of it on the telly (and I missed the news last night)

But I know it was a beautiful day in London despite living miles away. I know several people went to watch and enjoyed beer, I know Paul Colman was looking for a fellow spectator, that Rick Lamb wore flip flops (I assume he wasn't running), that Simon Charlesworth ran in under 4 hours despite stopping 4 times and that Mike was raising money for guide dogs for the blind.

I know this entirely from emails, just giving links (having to write an email trying to rustle up money for yet another marathon run must be the toughest gig their is), from facebook status updates and from Twitter.

When I was about 12 I remember Mrs Hughes from school ran the marathon. It was amazing, we all watched on telly to see if we could spot her. But because she had a couple of days off afterwards we didn't know how she did until she came into school and gave an assembly on it (I remember being impressed by her mars branded tin foil wrap thing they give you afterwards which she came in wearing)

Now the complete opposite is true. You know how your mates got on instantly but don't really take any notice of the main event.

Not all of this is down to technology of course. I'm also at a slightly different lifestage I reckon (and you can argue that the marathon still being on tv helps give it the prestige it has that gets people wanting to run it or comment on it)