Social Media Friends, Loneliness Is Alive And Well
Twitter users actively form real-time communities around everything from favorite TV shows to breaking political news, we can easily be led to think that loneliness is an outdated phenomenon. But it is not.
What Would You Do? The Practice of Connecting.
If you have a few minutes, I'd love for you to watch this video and think with me about the elements involved in connecting with people (online or face-to-face).
For example:
What do you think you would do if you passed by this couple?
Have you ever opted to be confrontational or to intervene on behalf of a stranger?
What do you think makes some people, although obviously concerned, keep walking?
What is it that motivates us to act?
What is the cost of constantly checking your phone?
On Thursday, we opened up a discussion about whether smart phones (and our addictions to them) are chipping away at the fabric of society. And then on Friday, we continued along this theme by taking on Facebook doubles, those highly-polished online versions of your more-flawed human selves.
Today we continue along these lines.
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Let's first acknowledge that probably for most of us, at our best, technology is supplemental--it's supportive to our lives. It extends and reinforces ...
Fake Facebook: Are you living a double life…by projecting yourself differently online than in real life?
Some even report feeling pressured to choose activities worthy of posting or tweeting about. They're literally scheduling their day around whether or not they think certain activities would impress their followers or (gag) maintain their brand in the marketplace.
Will Internet Addiction, Cell Phone Addiction, or Other Forms of Technology Addictions Slowly Chip Away at the Fabric of Society?
But the irony in it all of course is that all the previous inventions that had our grandparents perma-scowling from their la-z-boys and front porch rockers—the telephone or the radio or the television and so on--didn’t lead to the downfall of civilization after all. Humans are, in fact, pretty adaptable creatures who almost always find a way to integrate technology into the normal rhythms of life.