CHAPTER 6 ENTRY

"The social Web says that we have many friends out there just waiting to be found and connected to, and those friends have other friends (friends of a friend or "FOAF") who can just as easily connect with us and point us to new and interesting information for learning." (85)

A "FOAF"? What? I'm coming more and more to the shocking conclusion that I am old fashioned as the technological dark ages! Well, almost anyway. As I sit in a dark basement typing this to whatever faceless person may end up reading it I can't help but bring up a moment of recollection.

It was a pleasant day when I arrived far to early on campus for a class in the Humanities building here on campus. I had some reading to catch-up on so I thought I'd sit in the building's waiting area and read. It wasn't easy to find a comfortable seat because apparently I was not the only student with no place better to go on a pretty day but inside a dull building. Not really feeling enthralled with my reading I decided to observe people as it is one of my favorite things to do. As I looked around I noticed four students with head phone attached as they listed to ipods, MP3's and laptops. Several students had laptops out. One girl was busy texting, while another talked loud enough on her cell phone for all of us to hear her side of the conversation. There was a young guy playing with some sort of technical gadget I can only guess was a game and another guy looking like he was working with some sort if digitalized planner.

I sat back and watched them all. I must have sat there a half an hour as students came and went and nearly every person I saw was plugged in! I'd never stopped to notice this before, and in that half an hour I witnessed what can not possibly be the ordinary, but we sure are heading in this direction--I did not see a single conversation take place between two people that were physically present in front of each other. I watched all these people come and go and not one of them looked at me, or anyone else. Sure many of them were communicating, but they were communicating through technology and not in person.

I thought, if I tried to spark a conversation with anyone around me right now I would just be invading whatever it is they are doing with their technology and how sad is that. I tried to imagine this same room years ago before the cell phones and the Internet. I bet friends were made on the spot and relationships formed. Those friends probably introduced them to their "FOAF's" in person! and you were able to decide immediately whether to spend any more of your time on the people you networked with becuase you were able to see how they were raw and IN PERSON.

I do not like to use the Internet for my social life and it worries me that as people turn more and more to the Web for social interaction they will eventually become dependent on it and stop trying to meet right on the spot and in person entirely. Everyone will have to screen each other online first.

I guess I'm a real pessimist when it comes to this, but the social Web makes me long for days gone by.

I do like the idea of the social bookmarking services though and I wrote about this in my Choose Your Tool Assignment blog.

Oh, and Twitter just sounds kinda creepy to me.