Social Networking: Changing the Definition of "Social" One Poke at a Time

I don't particularly consider myself to be a "social" person. Throughout my youth, I was always the one picked last for kickball at recess, or sometimes I just played on my own. I was however, picked first by the bullies at school who somehow saw me as someone who had boatloads of lunch money. I must have exuded the sort of aura which many found weird, standoffish, or even intimidating (I tend to prefer the latter) because I never actively sought out the type of social acceptance that seemed to be the norm, especially in junior and senior high school. I extra-curricular activities a chose (and still choose to some extent) were those that placed me in front of a crowd, rather than in the middle of one, which is where I prefer to be to this day, though to a somewhat lesser extent most likely. So how does someone like me, who grew up having very few close friends, end up with having (at last tally) 657 "friends" on Facebook? Now, this is not to say that those bullies from junior high are in my social network (I actually think they're in the slammer, actually), but it would seem like an awful lot of these "friends" are people with whom I have a very tenuous connection. Indeed, there are even a few I have never actually met face-to-face!
In chapter 5 of her book Always On: Language in an  Online and Mobile World, Naomi Baron addresses the online "friend" phenomenon, specifically on Facebook. Her study of this online experience discovered that many users are in fact quite "casual" in the way they accept friends, and this in no way is correlative with the number of "real" friends they have and even goes as far as identifying this trend as comparable to a sort of online sport (p. 89). I will readily admit that I have fallen victim to this very trend on numerous occasions since Facebook has an element of excitement and intrigue that is downright addictive. So, it is easy to get wrapped up in this and forget that the person you just confirmed as a "friend" is actually someone you met once for ten minutes almost a decade ago. It seems to me that Facebook, as well as other social network sites, are attracting generations of shy and anti-social folks and allowing them to make connections that they normally would have never made. Baron also analyzes the IM applications and how people use their "away messages" to give the appearance of being out and about with a group of friends, when in actuality, their sitting in their room alone doing nothing. It would seem then, that these social network sites allow everybody, regardless of social status, to have a presence everywhere without leaving home.
Erik Qualman, in his book Socialnomics, discusses the overall efficacy of social networks. One point that he brings up is how blogging is an indispensible tool for recording your thoughts and opinions, and also for sharing news. Nowadays, people expect the news to come to them and are often put off by having to have subscriptions to online newspapers in order to get the latest scoop. Blogging is a way for regular, everyday people to become recognized experts in their areas of interest because they are right there experiencing the news, whereas a reporter for a newspaper is simply reporting second-hand information. It took me quite a while (relatively speaking) to get into blogging. I'm still trying to make my blog posts as personalized as possible rather than making them sound like a formal essay. But through my recent experiences with blogging, I am able to see why it is so popular and why it is gaining acceptance not only a valuable research tool, but also for the purposes of social networking and getting my ideas into the public sphere.
I used to lament the fact that I was a little anti-social, mostly because I realized that I came off as being a little rude when I chose to keep to myself in social situations. Even though I am still somewhat ill at ease in social situations, I have found solace in my ability to network with a large number of people and to promote my own projects without having to put myself into those uncomfortable environments where I am expected to be talkative and outgoing. Now I have a sort of shield which is helping me express myself in a manner which works for me.

New Technologies

Advances in communication technologies are certainly nothing new, and neither are the controversies that surround them. Alexander Graham Bell is widely credited as the inventor of the telephone, but many believe he stole the idea from Elisha Gray. Guglielmo Marconi is known by many as inventor of the radio, though this too is disputed by those who claim that Nikola Tesla had the idea first. Regardless of what actually happened in these instances, there were great thinkers who became household names and indelibly linked to a new gadget or technology. This does not seem be the case today. Though the thinkers are no less great, their names are unknown to most. Unless you are a tech-savvy consumer who follows all of the latest developments, you probably don't know the name(s) of the person (or people) who actually invented the gadget. Does the name Tim Berners-Lee ring a bell to anyone? The MIT professor credited for inventing the World Wide Web is probably not a household name.
In their book, Technological Visions: Hopes And Fears That Shape New Technologies, Marita Sturken and Douglas Thomas write in their introduction that technology is a "force unto itself and beyond human control" (p. 4). This idea lends credence to the notion that it is an autonomous entity that not only "transcends history" as Sturken and Thomas suggest, but also transcends the individual mind or minds. Perhaps this is one reason why the thinkers behind these advancements are either unknown, or disputed at best. This theory is perhaps a little abstract and off-topic, but again it ties in with the notion that technologies, specifically those linked to communication, seem to pop out of nowhere, all on their own, as if waiting to be discovered. Also noted in this introduction is the idea that the history of any technology can only be fully understood when looked at in context with other technologies when they first came out. In this way, one can see how closely linked they are with the cultural and socio-political dynamics of their time and how they only could have arisen at that exact time.
So, does technology's ostensible transcendency have any ties to how a great number of people conciously drag their feet when it comes to adopting the latest and greatest thing? Or do these folks simply have difficulty keeping up with the frenetic pace at which technology advances? Or could it be a combination of the two? Does technology advance at such a pace that it can't keep up with itself? I have a friend that refused to embrace the internet phenmomenon until around 2003 or so. He kept telling me that he was waiting for it to get "good enough." To this day I still have no idea what his definition of "good enough" was (I suppose I could just ask him), but even then it made me wonder if the internet had come around so quickly that it predated itself, or that it had come around so quickly that it took civilization that long to catch up to it. Again, it's probably a combination of all of these possibilities. From my perspective, I think about how long it seems to take for me to embrace the latest wonders of modern technology and realize that there is probably more out there than anyone knows.

Becoming Literate in the Information Age

The Hawisher and Hawke article was extremely interesting. It was more than just a simple discussion on the evolution of technology; it gave us the ability to take a peek inside the lives of two women a generation apart and examine how technology has changed the meaning of literacy. In their introductory remarks, the authors opine that "if students cannot write on the screen - if they cannot design, author, analyze, and interpret material on the Web and in other digital environments - they may be incapable of functioning effectively as literate citizens in a growing number of social spheres" (p. 642). So is this the end of the world for those who may choose to be old-school in their views of literacy and not bother with becoming tech-savvy? I realize that this is not the point of the article, but I could not help but be drawn to this statement because of the number of people I deal with on a weekly basis from all age groups who have no interest at all in computers. I personally believe that it is important for everyone to embrace the progression of technology and become savvy in all areas of basic literacy. But at the same time, I can understand why some folks choose to be a simplistic as possible when it comes to this.

The stories of Melissa and Brittany were very compelling, mostly because I learned a great deal about how individuals from different generations have absorbed technology and made it a central tenet of the personal and professional lives. I was born in between these two ladies and saw similarities in how they've assimilated technology into their lives with my own experiences, but also have noted some differences. For example, computers had become pretty well mainstream by the time I started elementary school so I cannot recall not using computers. This is a key difference between myself and Melissa, who had grown up before this time. On the other hand, I remember the days before the internet, like Melissa, but unlike Brittany, who grew up using e-mail and online chat as a regular part of daily life. So it was really intriguing for me to read about how different these two individuals are, but also how much they really have in common. One of the conclusions the authors drew from their study is that literacies have lifespans: "they overlap and compete with pre-existing forms; they accumulate, especially, perhaps, in periods of transition; they also eventually fade away" (p. 665). This idea certainly seems very likely as it pertains to technology, but will print forms (such as books) ever really fade away? My personal belief is no, but their relative importance seems to be rivaled by the internet and other digital resources.

Another idea that popped into my head while reading the article is this: Even though two individuals grow up and become educated in different generations, I believe it is possible for them to gain the same amount of knowledge on a particular subject. For instance, I believe that Melissa and Brittany can ultimately be equally as knowledgable about technology and literacy, but can they have the same level of understanding? It would seem to me that Melissa, who grew up seeing the evolution of technology first hand, could possibly have a greater understanding of it because of this; whereas Brittany was born into it and doesn't know a world without technology. Does this fact actually give Melissa the upper hand from an historical perspective? History does seem to be a strong underlying factor in this study, even though the main focus was elsewhere.