I feel like I am a minority in the world of social technology. I don't own a blackberry nor an iPhone. I have a regular phone, a Samsung which I bought 2 years ago, and it is still working perfectly. It does all the tasks that a regular phone is supposed to do. I can talk to my family, friends, and sometimes annoying telemarketers. I can make it ring or vibrate. But I usually have it on silent. I can calculate how much tip I need to leave for the waitress. I can check the date and time on it when I'm not wearing my watch. I can do my most favourite thing, text messaging with it. It also has a camera which I rarely use since I just got a new good ass camera, so no need to use a low-rez cell phone cam. I refuse changing it anytime soon, not at least until it stops working. And when it's time to get a new one, I don't think I'd go for a blackberry nor become an iUser.
I am at my favourite Starbucks, yes, again... while writing this. I didn't know I'd be inspired to write today, so I came unprepared. But my last conversation with my mum and my best friend and reading a piece in the New York Times on 'Social Technology' inspired me and started my brain engine. I don't have a laptop to transfer my thoughts into words. But I know I have to write them down right away before they disappear. So with my coffee I get a cookie, so that I can use the bag as my paper. I look around. Almost everyone is busy on their laptops or their cell phones. Some people look at me weird wondering why I am writing on a cookie bag. I've never felt desperate to have a laptop nor an iPad. I have a great PC at home and the best iMac at work. I use them for work since my full-time job and my freelance work depend on them. I also use them to communicate with my friends and family since most of them are in Toronto or outside of Canada. And sometimes I watch movies or TV shows since I don't cable.
I have a Facebook, Twitter, Blogger, Skype, and LinkedIn account. And I use these accounts for specific purposes. My Facebook is to stay in touch with my friends and family, specially to get informed of what's going on in their life. Twitter is a great social medium to find out about the latest in politics, arts, design, and my other interests. My Blogger is my therapist. It is where I can write and write and just easily express myself. I use my Skype once a week to talk to my best friend who I dearly miss, and thank to Skype I get the chance to talk to her for free for an hour or so since she lives in Toronto and I'm in Ottawa, and it's a long distance for us to talk on the phone. At last, my LinkedIn gives me the opportunity to network with my current and former coworkers and other professionals out there.
I don't have access to my personal email nor Facebook from work. But I can still check my Twitter, blog, and my LinkedIn. I found it quite bizarre and very difficult to adapt in the beginning. But now I don't find it necessary to check my personal accounts while at work. If I need to check them, I can use the computer downstairs in the library, the only device in the whole company with 200 employees that I can use for my unrelated work purposes. But I'm too busy to do that anyway. And if my family and close friends desperately need to get a hold of me, they all have my cell and my work numbers. Or they can email me at work which they usually do anyway. So my personal accounts can wait to be checked until I get home.
What I find quite bizarre with the social media is people exposing their entire life on them. They write about their daily routines. Or where they are at the time. Or they upload their personal pictures or even their kids' pictures. Doesn't privacy mean anything anymore? Or maybe it's outdated, and I am the only one who's not aware of it?! Why is it important for Sally to tell the whole world on her Facebook that she's about to take a shower? Is she that desperate for attention? Or she has nothing better to do? Also, with all those child predators out there, how can parents put their kids' pictures on the cyberspace where everyone has easily view them? And why do people find the need to inform the whole world of where they are at the time? Aren't they afraid of the thieves and all those criminals out there who can easily break into their house and property while they are enjoying their dinner at their favourite restaurant or watching their favourite band performing? These days you don't need to be a CIA agent to find someone's profile. Your identity is very much exposed because of the social technology. The world of cyberspace has made it so accessible for everyone to easily find whom they're looking for. You can easily put her name in the google search engine, and there you go... you have her entire family tree or her contact info. But despite all these, people are still doing it. Even those who are afraid of change or taking risk in their life, taking all these unnecessary risks in the world of cyberspace.
Or maybe I'm being ignorant? Is there something that I am missing out here? Or am I scared? Is it my past experience which makes me vulnerable to this world of social media or cyberspace in general and not letting me to fully understand it? But yet whatever it is, I still find my privacy more important than getting fully involved with all these high-tech communications. I don't need to be in touch with the outside world the whole time. I value my time and space to do what I enjoy to do, to do something productive. I don't need internet on my cell phone nor carry a laptop to a coffee shop where I usually go to escape the cyberspace distraction in order to get some work done. It's my time when I can be creative.
However, I still find the social media quite fascinating and very much needed in our life only if they're used properly. Since the social media occupy most of our daily routines, we need to include it in our educational system. I think it is necessary to educate the public on this matter. Social technology is affecting our life big time. And sometimes it gets to the point that it take the leash away from us. Many and many relationships end because of that. Youths and adults are forgetting about a simple eye contact or how to express their emotions outside of the world of cyberspace since they spend most of their time on their high-tech devices. If this becomes a norm, I'm afraid we would end up with the rise in the number of people suffering from depression, broken families, divorces, troubled teenagers, and many more. So before it's too late, we need to take charge to stop this new -ization!
No comments:
Post a Comment