@ Adrian:
Which is exactly the implementation of Google+. The only way to share with people is to put them in “circles” and then you choose what you share to which circle, and how much of your profile and information each circle is allowed to see.
Facebook has that too, implemented by friend lists but it is has less granularity.
]]>I kind of hate how everything has to be tied in with everything else. Professional contacts, friends, acquaintances, .. they all have to be on the same platform, i.e., Facebook.
I used to mail with professional contacts and perhaps acquaintances, MSN with friends, chat ingame with fellow gamers and blab about on IRC with linux enthousiasts and hackers (not crackers) and whatnot. Now it’s all a jumbled mess of people using a generic platform that isn’t particularly suited to the goal.
And in fact, I believe this is completely unnatural to our society.
When you’re out with friends and you meet a colleague (one who’s more colleague than friend), more often then not, it becomes incredibly awkward.
We have social circles. Not a circle.
But, I also have to note that in some cases, FB et al have made a relationship with someone much more valuable.
]]>@ cptacek:
Thanks! It’s always nice to hear that someone got a great deal of enjoyment of this here blog. I hope you stick around and continue reading into the future. I have no intentions of stopping to write any time soon. :)
@ Dave:
See, I have never seen that. Maybe it’s because I just don’t typically go where “youngsters” hang out but from casual observations while on college campus or out and about, most young people don’t text each other when hanging out. They text other people who could not be there or perhaps live tweeting/facebooking the event so that other friends can experience it vicariously.
I really don’t think it is impacting verbal communication or interpersonal relationships, though it probably does impact their writing skills a bit. I do see text speak sometimes bleeding into the homeworks… Then again, I usually blame gaps in high school education rather than the technology itself for this.
]]>It’s perhaps not the technology itself which is good or bad, but rather the perceived outcome of using said technology based on each users experience/interaction with it.
One could say SMS is great for popping a quick text off to a loved one or friend to see if they remembered to pick up the laundry or if they wanna go fishing on the weekend.
One could also say SMS is terrible when one sees a group of youngsters hanging out, except they are all engrossed in their phones and texting each other instead of engaging in conversation.
“Guns don’t kill people – people kill people”
]]>Dear Luke,
I stumbled on your blog 2-3 weeks ago, searching for something regarding batch files. Don’t remember what it was, really. I do know the post was from sometime in 2006. You fixed my problem, so yay! But, since then, I’ve read, or at least clicked through every entry you have made. There was a time around the 2008 entries where I was wondering…does he make it to today, present day, 2011? I didn’t look at the side bar that archives all of your posts just to keep the suspense building. And once I made it to this page, and there were no more “next post” links, I felt like I got to the end of the internet :)
You have a very entertaining blog here, sir. I’ve kept some bookmarks to some previous blog posts you made I wanted to comment on, but wanted to get here, to the current ending, before making them. Don’t know why. It was like my own little internet quest.
Oh, and your Crossloop suggestion has helped me get a freelance job. Thanks!
]]>@ Eric:
Really? I don’t see that ever happening. We are actually social animals. People enjoy going out and meeting each other face to face. Even introverts do enjoy human contact. What we are talking about here are just tools that help us communicate better.
The invention of the telephone did not undermine the fabric of our society. We incorporated it into our daily lives. It is the same with these new asynchronous communication methods and social media. It’s just another way to communicate.
If you observe the verbal traffic on your Facebook wall for a while you will notice that a lot of it is tied to real life events:
– people gossiping about who is in relationship with whom
– people sharing pictures from events and outings they have been to together
– people organizing parties and/or social events
– people organizing informal ad-hoc gatherings (ie. “hanging out in the quad with X and Y, join us”)
These tools are used as extension of our real life relationship – not as replacement.
]]>I could easily see us turning into the Solairians from Asimovs book foundation and Earth. They were hermaphrodites who lived alone and only had communication with other people via video conferencing when there was no other choice.
]]>astine wrote:
I have friends who I communicate with through Facebook, email, phone and face-to-face and face-to-face is always betters. I find it difficult to maintain a relationship with someone I only communicate through secondary means compared to people I see everyday.
I completely agree. Maybe I wasn’t clear enough, but to me online communication is just one of the many media we can use to stay connected. I never claimed it could replace regular face-to-face interaction. That would be silly. It just gives us another way to stay in touch – in addition to talking on the phone, or meeting face to face.
I agree that it is difficult to get to know someone without meeting them in person. But like I said – often online interaction may lead to real life relationships.
astine wrote:
I don’t like having to maintain an online persona. I don’t like how how so much of the Internet require a degree extroversion that I don’t have.
Interesting. I’m an introvert but I feel quite opposite. I have no problem maintaining an online persona because I can do that on my own convenience. Furthermore I feel like I have more control over how I present myself online and via the written word than in person. For example, I can sit here and think for a few minutes on how to phrase my comment and revise it to my liking, whereas in real-time conversation I have mere seconds to respond.
I usually don’t blab this much in person – I am pretty quiet actually. But this little soapbox of mine lets me rant about whatever comes to my mind.
astine wrote:
I dislike how even if I meet someone in person, they expect to be freinds on Facebook too and I can no longer just have a meat-space relationship like I used to, I have to be cyber-friends with everone as well
Hmmm…. See I never really thought about it like that. To me this is just another medium. It’s like giving someone my phone number or my email. I don’t really spend that much time using Facebook or Google plus or whatever. But it is a nice and convenient way to reach people with trivial non-urgent (not phone worthy) queries, share pictures and etc…
]]>I don’t know Luke, I have friends who I communicate with through Facebook, email, phone and face-to-face and face-to-face is always betters. I find it difficult to maintain a relationship with someone I only communicate through secondary means compared to people I see everyday. It’s not that the Internet is necessarily damaging, I certainly like ease with which it me to meet and keep up with others, but at the end of the day, I feel like I can’t really get to know someone unless I meet them in person. (That is, unless maybe, they are extremely extroverted online, which many of the most interesting people aren’t.) You just miss so much by way of non-verbal communication as well as thought and notions which would usually be filtered out of email or Facebook. Of course, I think that the existence of the Internet is overall a good thing. Email, blogs, message boards, etc are a benefit rather than a curse, but face-time (by which I don’t mean video-chat) is better.
I have other complaints. I don’t like having to maintain an online persona. I don’t like how how so much of the Internet require a degree extroversion that I don’t have. I don’t like how I need to police my reputation even if I don’t regularly post embarassing stuff to my Facebook page. I don’t like how nearly every one of my words online is saved somewhere easily googlable by someone who is just nosy and bored enough. I dislike how even if I meet someone in person, they expect to be freinds on Facebook too and I can no longer just have a meat-space relationship like I used to, I have to be cyber-friends with everone as well.
You’ll note that most of the complaints are against Facebook and social networks and the Internet in general. I hate Facebook with a passion, for so many reasons. But notice that none of them really has anything to do with nostalgia or fear of the Internet/Facebook. Most are actual problems that I’ve been bit by. I still appreciate the benefits of email and the like but I think that they arte a mixed blessing. If that makes me some kind of Naderite, then so be it.
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