the commodity of memory

In all this talk and reading dealing with the identity and self, it could be arguable that our memories make up a majority of how we interact with the present and future world. We carry with us through the day, whether or not you feel you are the same person, a consistent sense of being alive and having been alive. Things happen to us within and beyond our control and how we respond to these occurrences (our experience), including how we conquer or succumb to a situation, becomes a display of our person/ character/ self. Our experiences are collected by our consciousness and stored, readily available, as "memory" which we may recall to decide future situations that arise. We store the events we find either most traumatic or most pleasurable at the forefront of this cache, but all conscious experience exists in our minds to be recalled under the proper circumstance.
If Humans developed the technology to capture memories, the output (playback) system involved will be the ultimate factor in how these captured memories can be used by society and the individual. Other classmates have mentioned proposed forms of experiencing these recalled memories in the same manner as a film or short film, or (more interestingly) "uploading" memories from one brain's memory bank and "downloading" them to another consciousness in a form where they might actually believe they have experienced something they have not.

Two big things come to mind with these ideas. One of which has surprisingly remained unmentioned so far by fellow bloggers.
If we make memories a commodity, how do we determine which memories are meaningful or worth more than other memories. Will happy memories be demanded over sad memories or even horrific and traumatic memories? Will the stories of triumph and success be sought over the remembrance of failure? And should this happen, will people begin making their livings by selling their experience? (Memory Manufacturers)
Second, should we achieve the ability to transfer memory between consciousness' in a state where they believe they are truly experiencing the event (not simply watching a movie) there is the thought that people would no longer need to experience their own lives, but could stagnate in their living rooms while living vicariously through "downloaded" memories. This sort of lifestyle would necessitate that people are (on the other side) devoting their lives to capturing the memories these people want to experience.
So, on this note, where could we draw the line on captured memory where it doesn't become a form of entertainment? If people desired to experience a moment and feel as if they were actually there would they know whether the "memory" they were experiencing was captured as a true spontaneous moment in history or a staged event intended to be sold?
It would be the same, as McLuhan's article mentioned, that if you consider the printed document (book or magazine) as an object on which to capture a memory, how the memories captured in print have been so handled.

The transfer of knowledge is absolutely capable through this means of memory transfer. Who would ever need a book again if you could give your knowledge to someone else by having them experience your memory directly? How many times have you all thought about a time you wish other people could have been in your shoes? If they had been there they could relate to you...This would be able to do that.

This is the thing I'm surprised has yet to be mentioned... no one has been able to think of a good reason for memory sharing. Why would you want to allow public access to your most personal possessions?
If you could have someone, or a group of people, be given the first-person account of which they are unfamiliar with or could never experience as a part of their everyday lives. The ability to show the world through someone else's eyes could be the starting point for a method of creating complete awareness of human existence within the individual. - for instance, a young girl caught in a civil war that has destroyed her home and killed her family - vs. a middle-aged, single, suburban resident with a steady income commuting day to day... neither understands or has any thought as to the everyday happenings of the other, but in a sense, they are universally connected. And so could the ability of exchanging these two individuals' memories and experiences with each other open a greater level of understanding the innumberable veins of our humanistic existence.

To end this blog. This form of technology would drastically alter our mindset towards memory; it would no longer be the thing that truly defines us if it is so set in stone. Part of what's so great (and sometimes frustrating) about memory is that they are not all that definite. Two people standing next to each other may have differing recollections of the same event because of where their attention was pointed or not pointed, and subsequently, what their perceptions caught and didn't. This is what creates differing senses of importance for one event. We, as humans, have all been solely responsible for the cultivation of our own memories... what we remember and why we remember it/how it affects us. We have been able to set the limits of what other people are allowed to know about an event that were not there, but if we can make commodity of memory, in such a form where it is shown as an unaltered document of a point in time, we will no longer have the same ability to control aspects of our personal histories. The "Tall Tales" and exaggerated story telling techniques of tribal man would now be able to be checked for truthfulness by accessing one's memory file of that event.