Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Why Social Networking?

Social Networking and Human Relations

In today's fast paced environment people have learned to be in more than one place at a time. How have we achieved that? We use our cell phones to text each other while we work, while, we eat, and while we are supposed to be working. Let's take for example social networks such as facebook, where you can get online via cellphone and post immediatley what your doing at that exact moment. How many times have we encountered many of our friends posting what they literally are doing at that exact moment?
Example: "Maria is...eating lunch...working out, sick, etc...or in the bathroom" I have thought about this many times, why is it that people have to post what they are doing exactly at that moment? Then it hit me like the ugly truth that i had always known. People want to be acknowledged, noticed, and recognized. People open an account on a social network in order to fulfill that need, the need to be accepted by their internet peers, whom they've never met in person, yet share the same common goal, to be noticed.
Let's take for example the people that instead of posting what they are doing at that given time, they post what they are thinking, feelings of sadness, joy, regrets, rage, and so forth. We have come into an era where we can act in a totally different manner in comparison to the way we act on a daily basis. I always call all those profiles that i have encountered upon social networks, a way that the person manifest their alter-ego, its the way that the person would like to be if ever given the opportunity in real time. Meanwhile we have people posting poetry or copycatting philosophical quotes and thoughts, art and music, in order to try to make it, ultimately seeking for acceptance from the masses, be it, internet friends whom you'll never meet, or companies in the pop industry whom you would like to impress.
Social networking will improve and one thing will aways be certain, people will always have the need to fullfill the desire to be acknowledged and to be seeked upon, if not, then why have a blog? Why have a profile in any social network? This is what makes us human, and in real time affects the way we interact with each other. Ultimately developing an addiction to our own profile browsing in those social networks that we have dedicate time and effort by posting pictures of ourselves, videos, bits and information and so forth. We as consumers of those social networks always want more, in terms of more people to add as friends on our profiles, more subscribers to our blogs, more profile views, more comments on our pages or walls. Users will always want more attention, despite they are getting or not getting it in real time, paying attention to them will always be a requisite when joining a social network.

With this in mind, i cannot seem to focus on one social network at a time, having a few profiles in different sites, as well as being a member on others, gives us the advantage to network, to let other people know about what we do. We can use it to empower ourselves or to destroy someone's reputation, it doesn't matter, all that matters is that it is that interactive force that drives us to meet and socialize outside of our comfort zone with people we would not dare to talk to in real time.

Do you agree that these social networks, like Face Book, and My Space are Booty Calls?
How many times have we spent searching for someone hot and interesting in those networks?
Guys log in to check out hot girls who end up posting pictures about their hanging out habits, drinking, adventures, etc, you name it, they have it, it's free and its voyerism.
Classic example: Guys sending pictures of their genitals by private messages, asking for messenger addresses, asking to meet in a casual "date" a.k.a. casual sex booty calling.
Hmm let's see, what else. There is this cyber friend i added because, of course i found her hot and interesting, she prides herself on being an s/m enthusiast, and needles to say the pictures speak for themselves, very entertaining, i must say. The point is that you can just log on and watch it, be it pictures, blogs, videos anything on anybody and that's the beauty in it.