Email, Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, YouTube, LinkedIn… It appears our world has never been more interconnected. It is everywhere, at anytime, within easy reach. But when it comes to relationships, are we still capable of differenciating electronic one of physical one? Are we substituting virtual life for real life?
From a general point a view, digital medias seem to be cold and inhuman. Can we actually compare a real-life hug to a “poke” on your facebook wall? Of course not. But we probably find it easier to communicate that way. We engage ourself less by avoiding face to face confrontation. While the social medias seem to be driving us apart, it also appears it can also take us to a whole new level of closeness, like peer-to-peer networking for example (where tasks are equally distributed between peers). The main issue I can’t succeed to answer is if we are losing a bit of our humanity on the way… Can both realities live together side to side, or is internet stealing bit-by-bit a part of our freedom without us noticing it? An article from The New-Yorker raises in a funny-clever way the issue of “How the Internet gets inside us”, see the link below.
http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/atlarge/2011/02/14/110214crat_atlarge_gopnik
One thing that qualifies new social technologies for sure is probably how confusing it is and how blurry its limits are.
LCC MAGD GROUP V 
It’s ironic that we are discussing this topic on BLOG… We can’t deny the benefits of the internet, however, more and more people get addicted to it. Maybe because of the conveniences, being out of network connection becomes scary. It’s just gone crazy that in our generation, we use digital camera, mobile phone, computer… at the same time. The ‘always-on’ culture could possibly confuse people about what is real or what is virtual, because it seems we’ve already lived in two worlds.
Facebook is not a platform for big, important discussions, but smalltalk – it’s the small everyday things, which enrich the social networks.
By using such platforms, you always reveal something about yourself – this process is somehow about self expression/profiling and reinventing oneself. But wouldn’t you to some extent, also find these processes in other forms of social life – if at a job interview or just in public?!
If you use facebook in a ‘right’ way, you’ll be able to let you and your life appear beautiful and exciting. Reading an article about the very same topic, I came across the expression ‘impression management’ – in other words, the way I present myself, the way I speak and the way I dress up.
Some people are convinced that facebook won’t be very persistent, as the internet just moves too fast, but what will remain, I am sure of, is the way of communication – of social exchange. Being able to create your own public appearance is too beneficial to give up on that.
I heard on the radio this morning people are more unhappy and doesnt laugh as much today as they used to a couple of years ago. I blame facebook a bit. I rarely laugh out loud in front of the screen but together wit my friends i laugh at all kind of stuff.
I also heard that people are getting depressed from all the status and blog updates from other people who seem to have more fun, more free time and a more interesting life.