For those out of the loop or who attended a Daily Jolt-less school: It was a "cutting-edge" social networking website of sorts that pre-dated Facebook.
This site was designed to engage and create social interactions online for the students. It offered:
*a "facebook" cataloging images of students from each class
*lists of on-campus events
*movie times for cinestudio cinema
*and the all important- PARTY PICS.
The Trinity Chapter was run by two crew team members who would lovingly tote a digital camera from party to party snapping party photos to be uploaded by the next morning for our viewing pleasure. This little device serviced as an all-access- passport to every party on campus, no matter how exclusive. Every party thrower wanted their party to be validated by the Jolt.
As a result, it empowered these little Napoleons, because ultimately they dictated how you were to be publicly perceived by the Trinity audience. (our modern day comparison: just imagine someone getting a hold of your fbook account and tagging whatever photos they wanted, all the good/bad/ugly for all your school to see!)
As you can imagine it resulted in many-a-shallow- conversation piece every morning at breakfast in Mather dining hall... typical conversations overheard included-
"Oh man, I totally wished I had stayed out later... AD had late-night... I should have had the extra red-bull... I had class at 10 this morning, I totally could have stayed out later"
"Woof, did you see... I can't believe he hasn't realized all of the photos are still up.... cus I would have totally removed them? At what point did he lose his shirt during the course of the evening... "
"Dude, did you see Splat with that guy from the Hall, isn't she now with that guy from the soccer team... or was it the guy from the hockey team? I can't keep up. "
"I can't tell if the two Tri-delts realized they were wearing the same dress, do you think they were aiming for a Stepford-clone look courtesy of CKBradley?"
A good portion of the photos posted were images you would be horrified for the world to see
(at least the ones I was in) and generally resulted in an email requesting that "said image", (you know the one- donning a beer soaked rugby jersey in a glory stance from having just won the beirut tourney), be taken down effective immediately.
Now here's the point where you get to imagine your parents, the generous individuals paying your $45k tuition a year, turning on their computers in the morning, to see you enjoying the fruits of Trin's social offerings at 2am on Tuesday morning with mouth to nozzle in a keg-standing position. Not to pleased with what you have learned in college thusfar, no?
My parents, who were exceptionally technologically saavy at the time, were one of the first batches of parents to learn about the Jolt. Needless to say, from that point forward I had to spend the rest of my years at Trinity avoiding the Jolt camera for fear of the dreaded morning wake up call- "Lucy dear, we saw those photos on the Jolt it looked like you were having a splendid time. You are probably still asleep, as it looked like you attended three parties last night, Call us when you wake up, we would love to hear all about it!"
Thank God things have changed and Facebook has provided us with Buddy Blocks and untagging options!
I am not going to lie when I tell you that post-graduating I actually went back through the Party Pics to relive old times...
RIP DAILY JOLT. YOU DEFINITELY KEPT THINGS INTERESTING.
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