The days when people just wanted ‘things’ are long gone. In contemporary Britain, things get us into spaces - but are spaces for real people, or ‘things’?

Talk too much to the people supposed to be in charge today, and you could be forgiven for thinking that things are not at all you'd imagined them to be. I’m not thinking here about optimistic economic data, rising A-level pass percentages and falling crime figures; no, I’m referring to the definition of ‘things’. Because they’re not what they used to be.

I used to think that there were animate things and inanimate things. But that’s no longer clear: the important things - the stuff you simply must have in order to drag meaning into your drab life – are not things you drive, play, eat, drink or ride any more: they’re more like tickets to a must-see show.

When I was younger, hip things were for people going places: the folks who loved to go off the beaten track and off-piste. Today, cool things are for getting into spaces. Spaces that are online, on-message, on demand – and somehow, on the pulse of contemporary existence.

Pretty much everything now is a space. Inside the near-infinite web space there sit the Twitter space, the Face book space, the SMS space, the MSN space, the Skype space and the music space. Even banking has its insurance space, commodities space and bond space. Everything worth visiting is a space, and anyone who’s anything has to be in that space: without it, you’re cut off from real life.

Yet these spaces are where you know people you’ve never met, join communities you’ll never see, and visit places where you’ll never go. It’s the ultimate paradox: an inanimate, surrogate life become the reality of modern human relationships.

The old world’s fast lane consisted of people in the jet-set. The big bananas then were Pan Am, General Motors, J Walter Thompson, Mercedes-Benz, Coca-Cola, and Bond movies in which diamonds were forever.

But nothing is forever. In the new world of space cadets, there are Google, Orange, AOL, Vodafone, Newscorp, Microsoft, and a few others trailing behind. And these people quite clearly do not see us as customers, or even human. In fact, they don’t see us as animate at all.

The world that is almost gone today had genuine certainties. You got the taste of Coke wrong, it was vital to do something right now - today. If your new Ford Fiesta broke down, the garage fixed it free and the grease-monkey told you later (apologetically) what went wrong. If JWT’s ads told fibs, the ASA took them off-air. In the winter, the blokes at Mercedes would take your metal roof out of storage and fit it back on again. For you were the Sovereign Consumer.

Now you’re a subscriber. A mark, a patsy, a mug, a trick. Google will never give your name to third parties without permission, Orange are unable to control the inflow of spam, AOL would never dream of making it difficult for you to leave, all of Vodafone’s multimedia messages get through, Newscorp never breaks the law, Microsoft is open to new ideas and complaints from everyone, Twitter cares only about the social good it can do, internet traders and promotions never lie, and oh look, a piano just flew past the bathroom window.

They are the masters now.

Fings ain’t what they used to be because people are the things today: just things in spaces, things who lack the independence to do their own thing. But then, there’ll be no space for independent human beings in the future. The Elite is working on yet more gadgets to take all our citizens back to shallow waters – where they’ll be unable to swim, but feel much more comfortable.

They’ve got a whole ton of stuff in mind - Satnav for one. No need to think about where you’re going…just go there, be happy. And if you drive too fast, well – the new two-way Satnav the French plan to introduce in 2011 will ensure they always know what speed limit you’re driving in. And where you are.*

No more flat batteries of course, because the car lights turn on and off automatically. Just one thing less to be responsible for. No more difficult maths: you’re never less than three yards from a calculator. Computer on the blink? No sense repairing it, and anyway they need the sales. Get a new one. Car getting old? Government’ll buy you a new one. No worries.

Constipated? Cheer up: that 24/7 camera in the bathroom will record when you’ve not been for a day or two, and inform the doctor for you. And a policeman will pop round just to check that you haven’t been avoiding the bathroom for any other unwise reasons. Because – as we always say - the CCTV is there for your protection.

ID cards are no different to passports – Tony Blair said so. Think how convenient it’ll be for shop assistants and police and EU border guards to know for certain who you are. Otherwise you could so easily wind up in a prison somewhere. And not every country’s as free as ours, you know.

In a world where Fings ain’t wot they used to be, you can’t be too careful. But there there, now: nothing to fear, Lord Mandelson’s just a gentle old pussy-cat, and his first priority is to ensure you’re kept safe and sound.

Safely on a screen somewhere. And sound asleep.

*Lest Mandelson, Bradshawe & Balls dismiss this as mere Blogosmear fantasy, read today's Sunday Times, P11. Roop obviously thought the piece unworthy of the web space. The ST did however predict this right on the nail in 2005.

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