Thursday, September 13, 2012

IM SO TOTALLY, DIGITALLY CLOSE TO YOU




This entry is in reply to "I'm So Totally, Digitally Close To You," on how digital, social media is changing the way we interact with each other.  Here are two quotes that I though where especially true.  

But they also discovered that the little Ping-Ponging messages felt even more intimate than a phone call.

I like this quote because I find it to be very true.  Being on the phone with someone is different than texting someone through out the day.  When you’re on the phone for say an hour or however long your on the phone (I’ve had 4, 5, and even 6 hour phone conversations), you talk about things that have happened and are maybe going to happen.  Sure you mention what’s going on at the present moment, but its not the whole basis of the conversation.  When your texting someone throughout the day, you usually let each other know what your doing and it really is intimate.  Your not broadcasting it to the world like on Facebook or Twitter, your sending it specifically to one person to let he or she specifically know.  So to receive a text saying something like “hey, just got to school,” is something special and lets you know that person is thinking about you and wanted to let you, just you; know what they where up to.


“I have a rule,” she told me. “I either have to know who you are, or I have to know of you.” That means she monitors the lives of friends, family, anyone she works with, and she’ll also follow interesting people she discovers via her friends’ online lives. Like many people who live online, she has wound up following a few strangers — though after a few months they no longer feel like strangers, despite the fact that she has never physically met them.


This quote is very true, and to be honest, if I really think about it, it’s kind of unbelievable.  I can’t remember exactly how many people I’ve met online, but it’s been a bit.  Some were friends of my friends, others complete strangers.  I’ve met older people, younger people, both male and female.  I’ve became friends some of them, good friends with some of the guys, and have even had relations with some of the women.  Isn’t that insane?  To think that I have met complete random women online and have had relations with them is a very strange though to me.  But then again, its almost no different than meeting someone at a bar, club or anywhere else.  Really, to be honest; now a days, meeting someone on Facebook or twitter (or any of the many social media websites) might be a more intimate way of meeting someone than in person.  On someone’s online account I can learn more about a person in a few minutes of reading than I can learn in weeks of physical and verbal interaction.  But a person can also be deceiving online.  They can make themselves out to be someone their not, or exaggerate their accomplishments or activities.  Everyone does it.  So maybe meeting someone online isn’t like meeting someone in person, because you might not be meeting an honest portrayal of that person.  It’s a risk to say the least.  


But where their sociality had truly exploded was in their “weak ties” — loose acquaintances, people they knew less well. It might be someone they met at a conference, or someone from high school who recently “friended” them on Facebook, or somebody from last year’s holiday party. In their pre-Internet lives, these sorts of acquaintances would have quickly faded from their attention. But when one of these far-flung people suddenly posts a personal note to your feed, it is essentially a reminder that they exist. I have noticed this effect myself.


I actually love this quote.  Facebook is the perfect "social medium."  (I just made that up.)  But it's perfect!  It's not as intimate as asking someone for their number; it'ss a way of keeping in touch with someone without actually keeping in touch.  It's so much easier to ask someone for their Facebook rather than their number.  To ask someone for their number usually means their is a mutual interest to actively keep in touch, or at least a certain level of trust or that you and that person had reached a point in knowing each other where it was appropriate to exchange numbers.  But that doesn't happen all the time.  Sometimes you meet people.... and thats it, you just meet them.  You don't expect to really be friends or keep in touch.  Like the quote says "someone they met at a conference, or someone from high school, or somebody from last year's holiday party."  Before Facebook, if I had met someone whom I did not feel comfortable exchanging numbers with.... well that would have been it.  There was nothing else to do, no other way to keep in touch unless we saw each other again.  But now, Facebook provides a perfect medium between intimacy and no contact.  A lot of times it's the starting point to friendships.  It's the perfect way to keep in touch with these "weak ties," without really physically keeping touch.  

4 comments:

  1. What's up with the white lines?? Can you fix that?

    "To think that I have met complete random women online and have had relations with them is a very strange though to me. But then again, its almost no different than meeting someone at a bar, club or anywhere else."

    I hear what you're saying. Strangers are strangers are strangers? lol. People who are going to lie or exaggerate will do so regardless of how you've met them. The kind of creepy thing is how random people approach you online though. Although it's just as creepy when random people approach you in real life too. So is there really no difference between meeting someone online or meeting them in real life??? Is that the world we live in today? lol (now I sound old).

    Interesting quotes and responses. I wish you had added the third one...(to complete the assignment as requested)

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  2. Mrs. Alvarez. I pretty much died laughing reading your reply. The article pretty much blew my mind on how social networking has changed the way we interact with people. It's so weird to think about! Seeing a girl at a bar and going up to her and saying "Hey, how are you? I'm Alejandro," is probably creepier than friend requesting a stranger with mutual friends on Facebook. Hahahaha. WOW. Mind - BLOWN. Oh, I'm sorry, for some reason I though it had said pick 2-3 quotes -__-. Apparently I'm horrible at directions, I'm going to go ahead and reply to a third quote and hopefully you can make it count...

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  3. Mrs. Alvarez, I just added a third quote and to be honest, you have no idea how blown my mind is right now as I think about the way Facebook and all these other social media sites have changed the way we socialize with each other. Reading the article a second time, I'm not sure I think this is a good thing, I honestly think social media is going to have a huge (negative) effect on people and only time will tell.

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  4. Thanks for adding a third quote :)

    As for future generations...we're all doomed, lol. Just kidding. I just think that we're going to end up having such weird relationships with each other. In 26 years, my nephew will be 30 and he'll be "friends" with every single human being that he's ever encountered. All 3 million of them. So weird. Nothing wrong with letting people go. I think future generations won't be able to do let go of anyone.

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