Tag: Facebook

Here’s a confession – I’ve not been blogging as much recently as I should have been.  The reason?  Twitter.

I use my blog to tell people what I’ve been doing recently.  My readers are usually friends and family, unless a passer-by happens to stumble across something via Google that interests them.  My posts are generally about things I’m interested in, things I’ve done, things I meant to do but didn’t, or things that I want to rant about.

But now I’ve fallen in love with Twitter, my Twhirl client always running on my desktop, ready to accept my latest status update as and when I feel led to bend the world’s ear with my 140 characters of insight.  No logging in, no pressure to write unnecessary paragraphs of fluff, just a short blast of information.  No time like the present.  The result is that I feel like I’ve told the world what’s going on, despite the noticeable absence on my blog.  So I apologise that I’ve not posted more here in recent weeks.  Blame Twitter for being so darn addictive.

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This is a useful Twitter widget - repeats everything everyone else has said.

I’ve never been one for associating with the ‘in crowd’.  I’ve never been particularly interested in trends, fashions, fads or crazes.  Well, I say never… I do remember a time when I was at primary school when Teenage Mutant Hero Turtle action figures were the big thing, and I saw everyone else playing with them, and I pestered my Mum to buy me one, and she did, and the day I brought mine into school was the day they went out of fashion.  It’s scarred me for life.  Not that I’m bitter.

Fast forward a decade or so and I’m still in a similar mindset, though it has evolved slightly.  My approach now is to observe the trend from a distance, and then when it’s established itself and the hype has died down, then I jump on the bandwagon, and hope to goodness that I haven’t left it too late.  As a result, I have never bought a brand new Mac, I still haven’t got an iPhone, I joined Facebook to find most of my friends already there, and I gave SecondLife a spin a year or so too late.  And now it’s happened again.  I’m on Twitter.

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H is for “Hello stranger”

Second Life.  Remember that?  It was all the rage a few years back, when it pioneered the idea of a virtual reality platform for online community and economy, and if I recall correctly there was a lot of hype around at the time.  Of course, I’m no sheep, so I steered clear of it at the time.  After all, I wasn’t a loner with no ‘real’ friends, so I had no need for an additional life to maintain.

So why is it that I downloaded the software last week?  Why have I been wandering around the Second Life worlds, exploring interesting locations, listening to music, chatting to people, dancing…?  I guess part of the cause is how cut off I’m feeling at the moment, having moved away from my circle of friends.  Sure, we’re living in a land of bliss, surrounded by beautiful countryside, the smell of cow dung floating on the breeze, and glorious hills to gaze at.  But we don’t know anyone.  Well, not many, and not as well as our ‘old’ friends.  I miss AM and Sarah, and the Phil(l)s, and my youth group at church, and my badminton partner, and all those other ex-uni folks who dropped in all the time.

Which leads me to an interesting muse.  What makes a friend?  And why is it important?

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I’m not usually one for following popular trends (I think I was emotionally scarred by the day Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles went out of fashion on the very day I proudly brought my action figure into school).  Facebook has been one of the exceptions, in that not only did I sign up fairly soon after it became big enough to catch my eye but I’m actually still a regular user of their services.  I have photos uploaded there, I use it to keep track of my friends, and I have no reason to stop any time soon.

I did however succumb to a Facebook-related trend that is probably beginning to grow old now – I uploaded a profile photo of me as a baby.  Well, about three years old anyway.  I even got a comment left by a friend of mine saying how cute I was.  And it got me thinking – who actually remembers me from when I was that age?  No one I’m in contact with now, apart from family of course.  The only people who would remember me from then would be my old friends from my first primary school, but I’ve not been in touch with any of them since… well, since I left in Year 3.

And this is where Facebook really comes into its own – a quick search brought up an unexpected surprise, finding someone who is potentially the first friend I ever made.

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