Digital Intimacy – Concepts I found interesting

1. When they do socialize face to face, it feels oddly as if they’ve never actually been apart. They don’t need to ask, “So, what have you been up to?” because they already know. Instead, they’ll begin discussing something that one of the friends Twittered that afternoon, as if picking up a conversation in the middle.

While I don’t Twitter with my friends, I do find that Facebook does serve the same purpose. You see someone, and you can immediately ask a relevant question. I definitely get to know more on FB than I would otherwise, and for some of my relationships, that’s a huge step up. Since I don’t have a huge number of friends on FB, they tend to be more than just “‘weak ties’ – loose acquaintances, people [I know] less well.”

2. Ambient intimacy becomes a way to “feel less alone,” as more than one Facebook and Twitter user told me.

I suppose that’s true. Each advancement in technology does allow me to be closer to my family, all of whom live at least a state away.

3. In contrast, ambient updates are all visible on one single page in a big row, and they’re not really directed at you. This makes them skimmable, like newspaper headlines; maybe you’ll read them all, maybe you’ll skip some.

While that may be theoretically true, some days reading my FB news feed (and responding as the mood strikes me) can take a significant chunk of time. Perhaps if I were connected via my phone, it would be different.

4. Sociologists have long found that “weak ties” greatly expand your ability to solve problems. AND Parasocial relationships can use up some of the emotional space in our Dunbar number, crowding out real-life people.

I thought the way the article evaluated the possible positive and negative consequences of digital intimacy to be enlightening. As I’ve stated before, I still have a fear about the lack of human-to-human, face-to-face contact with all these various new means of intimacy. I guess it’s a good thing that people are studying it.

5. People in their 20s who were in college when Facebook appeared…have never lived as adults without online awareness. For them, participation isn’t optional. If you don’t dive in, other people will define who you are. AND “If anything, it’s identity-constraining now,” Tufekci told me. “You can’t play with your identity if your audience is always checking up on you.”

It’s scary to think about other people defining who you are in the absence of your own online presence. It was something that has happened in the past to me (don’t want to get into it in a public forum), and in some ways, it’s a concern I have as a teacher. I don’t expect all my students to love me, but I don’t like for their complaints to have a wider audience than their close circle of friends or family.

On “identity –constraining”” I went to a high school where only 3 of my earlier classmates attended. Then, I went to college out of state with no one I knew. I’ve moved three times since then. All opportunities to reinvent myself. Sometimes, this was a good thing. I needed or wanted to move forward.