Just why are so many millions of people fascinated with the reality shows “Survivor” and “Big Brother”? Daniel Boorstin may have predicted the reason some 40 years ago. “Attributing the blurring of news and pseudo news to a combination of technical virtuosity and audience democratization, he wrote: ‘The image, more interesting than its original, has become the original. The shadow has become the substance.’ Images, synthetic and simplistic yet vivid and believable, have become the nation’s measure of what is real. – New York Times 07/04/00