Did Jacob from LOST Invent Facebook and Twitter?

WARNING: This has been written by a total LOST geek.

A couple of episodes ago it was revealed that Jacob, the mysterious figure on the mysterious island on ABC’s LOST, has been keeping a list of people who could become the future guardians of the island. Each of those people has a corresponding number, and “The Numbers” have had a recurring role on the series since the first season. If you’re a fan of the show, you can keep on reading. If you’re not, then I recommend you watch this video to catch up and get on the tube tonight to watch the best season ever.

So I’m watching the “Lighthouse” episode and it dawns on me that Jacob, not Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg or Twitter co-founder Evan Williams, may well have been the first social networker. First off, he’s been keeping a list of people, and that sort of behavior has been popularized by Twitter users who are grouping sets of people together.

I’m currently on 84 different lists, but if Jacob had a list, it would likely be twitter.com/Jacob/future-island-guardians. But Jacob, now deceased, only talks to some of the potential future guardians of the island, like Hurley, who can see him while others can’t. Maybe Jacob sends and receives Direct Messages only with Hurley because they are following each other. But Jack Shephard, who can’t see the dead Jacob, perhaps can only understand Hurley’s re-tweets of Jacob’s messages.

During last season’s finale, it was revealed that Jacob had physically touched each of the potential future guardians of the island. He poked them. Like on Facebook. (Jacob’s would be a Super Poke). Then, during the “Lighthouse” episode we learned that Jacob had a special mirror that could be directed through space and time to watch what all of the potential future guardians from afar. In other words, he could view their wall posts, videos, photo albums and personal activity.

When Jack realized that Jacob had been watching him and invading his privacy, he went ape shit on the lighthouse and destroyed the mirror. It reminded me of the hatred that fans had for Facebook’s Beacon that, like a lighthouse, opened up a window into the personal lives of others, uninvited. No one likes to have their privacy invaded in social media.

This current season’s focus is on a fake John Locke, Jacob’s nemesis, who is really the mysterious Man in Black/Smoke Monster, inhabiting dead Locke’s body. He’s the epitome of social media in-authenticity, impersonating someone’s profile to grow his following. Maybe the ankh that Jacob had Hurley give to Dogen at the temple was a virtual gift? Maybe all the whispering we’re hearing in the jungle is just a bunch of tweets? Maybe the Dharma Initiative videos are just viral videos? (I could go on and on like this.)

But ultimately, a mainstay of LOST has been that all characters are interconnected, like in a web. Or, perhaps like Jacob’s tapestry, a social network weaves them all together. I’ll just have to keep watching for more social media goodness in LOST to find out what Mark, I mean Ev, I mean Jacob, has up his sleeves.

Tagged as: ABC, Beacon, Evan Williams, Facebook, Jacob, Listorious, LOST, Mark Zuckerberg, Super poke, Twitter