Something to Say
I was on Facebook a little while back, sneaking a quick peek to see if anyone had posted any interesting new pictures. (Anything to put off work by a few more minutes!) None of my camera-happy friends had obliged so I stuck around hoping to find something else that would take my mind off deadlines. And I found it!
As I watched I noticed multiple posts by an acquaintance piling up under my eyes – apparently he had a lot to say and he was wasting no time saying it. The posts appeared every few minutes, the gap only long enough for his brain to process what he wanted to say next and the time it took for his fingers to type it. Quite frankly, I was amazed. Not only that he had so much to say but at his confidence that people out there actually wanted to read his observations, or musings, or whatever it was that he was so assiduously declaring.
It soon became evident that he was stuck in a traffic jam, and not content with merely muttering to himself in disgust, he was letting the world know it. I can only hope someone else was driving the car, since he obviously had better things to do than pay attention to the road or other frustrated drivers.
There are so many like him on Facebook and other online platforms. People who feel the need to make public their every little thought, broadcast their opinion on the most mundane issue, and generally remind others that they have a voice. And even while you may be one of those that don’t quite get this, you have to credit their gumption. I wouldn’t have the guts to make 95% of my thoughts public, leave alone find the courage to air such inanities on an online platform that anyone can access. (Ooops! Seems to me I’m doing just that! But Hub Pages is probably home to the 5% that I am willing to put out there for public scrutiny.)
How technology has changed things! Nothing is private anymore. There are no excuses left. We can’t blame an inefficient postal system or an indifferent telephone service for being out of touch, or not meeting deadlines. There is always an alternative, and none of our feeble explanations will stick. There is nowhere to hide.
The surprising thing is that few of us want to hide anymore. We quite enjoy living our lives in the full glare of accessibility. We want to air our thoughts and share our pictures and music and videos. We want to find and stay in touch with people we haven’t seen since kindergarten. We want to make friends with people that we probably never will meet face to face. The world has shrunk, and we have to do our bit to ensure it gets smaller and smaller.
I suppose when you get to a certain age you do tend to lapse into ‘Remember when’ reminiscences. The world sees dramatic change every few years, what to say of a few decades! How did we ever get by in an age when communication took much more than the click of a mouse? How did we connect with friends in the absence of mobile phones that do everything but make lunch? Did we actually send postcards or labour at letters to the editor of the local newspaper when we had something to say? Did we in fact, have anything of significance to say?
Today it doesn’t matter that we have nothing of importance to say. The thing is to say it anyway. That shows we are creatures of the present, comfortable with technology, and not afraid to air our opinions, or lack of them. We have to contribute to all the inconsequential online chatter; we are honour bound to update our status on networking sites on a regular basis. Oh yes, we must have something to say. There is always someone out there with a response.
We were thinking along the same lines. I just published a hub about Facebook too. Good hub.
Yeah, with the online fads growing in number, voicing of opinions has become a compulsion.
Nice article and good observation too. Cheers!
Hello VS, you are always one of the earliest to read my musings, so you are entitled to leave your own musings in return! I like the idea of making friends with someone in Shangri-la...or anywhere else for that matter. Yes, the Internet is great...but it can get intrusive at times. Thanks for reading. :)
elayne, I must go read your hub! Thanks for stopping by.
Hello again quicksand, today seems to be your comment-on-Hub Pages day! Thanks for reading. :)
There's something about the virtual world that makes a lot of us be a lot more open I guess! Yes, FP - I see what you mean - some people have sooooo much to say about everything :D
There's being open...and then there's spilling out more than anyone wants to see! But each to his own. :D
Thanks for reading, Shal.
I suppose it's a way everyone can get their 15 minutes of fame, or at least attention. Has the pendulum swung completely in the other direction to prudish silence and over-mannered correctness? I'm hoping we don't completely lose track of our sensitivities to ourselves and others. Technology can certainly make the world smaller, it can also shrink it to a very small and controlled circus.
Interesting observations Feline. As I grow older I have also grown wiser with technology. I was a letter writer in my time and waited for the snail mail for responses to my postings. However the new age brought all the tools to allow one to express oneself at the click of a mouse and the speed of the Internet. I to have been caught up with getting out as much as I can possibly can in the short time one has here on mother earth.
I have met people I never would have, I have chatted with people from one end of our planet to the next. People who I would or could not have met otherwise.
So yes we all have something to say and try to reach out where and whenever we can or for that matter, feel like it. One is only a click away from conveying ones thoughts and feelings to the world or to anyone who wants to listen or delete us. Great hub, I really like your reaching out here...oh well my 2 cents worth have taken a nickels worth...but heck my keyboard just keeps beckoning me to type more. He he he..
I remember when I first joined online forums...I had a little too much to say...spent too much of time on ...yeah you used the right word..inanities. I still have a lot to say, but now I just dont have the time, so the world is spared my blatherings ;)
Another intriguing insight from the prophet! Do you know that there are vending machines in our state from which you can purchase wine by the bottle? However, before you can finalize your purchase, you must swipe an ID card, blow into a breath analyzer, and look into a camera monitored by an anonymous body somewhere who verifies your identity and validates the sale (or not). How far are we stooping in allowing our privacy to be violated when we agree to stand in a crowded store being tested for alcohol consumption while being viewed by a hidden pair of eyes while we also cough up our identity?
As you say, FP, surely technology plays a significant role in our becoming placid about privacy, but I think the events following 911 play a role, too. By being made to take our shoes off in an airport, submit to one form of body search or another, and undergo other indignities, privacy was being invaded under the guise of protecting national security. At that point we started to become desensitized to its loss.
Gosh darn it! You always make me think, and now my head's tired!
So, FP. You have at last decided to honour us with a hub after such a long time. Personally I missed you, believe it or not, even though you use words to describe your friends’ writings as “inane” :-)))
I am now going to take a page out of your book and not write anything for a month, in order to see if anyone will notice :-)))
Social networking has certainly crossed the "Tipping Point." Everyone is on the bandwagon, baring his soul to the world. Sometimes I wonder when or where it's going to stop or take a different direction.
But there is an interesting page on Facebook itself to which you can refer people who overdo it. It's called "Uhh TMI ... that's way more than I need to know." TMI, I presume, stands for too much information.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/uhh-TMIthats-way-mor/photo.php?pid=193704&id=108768705808628
we seem to be staking our existence on our social networking status.I have this "friend"(actually a niece) i stuck off my list and who then wrote me three highly emtional e mails saying how i had hurt her and how i had insulted her - so i just went and added her back- and we have not even exchanged a happy birthday message since then.
we are now in the age on inanties and the samllest thing about us now inane enough to be shared.Tjhere is this classic case i read of how a girl wrote on face book "just got up" and seventeen people reacted with wow, good morning, ahah and so on- as if they came to wakefulness by some other method!!!on my orkut forum there are people wishing other people haapy birthdays and then condoling someone for the death of a parent or spouse with the same display picture with a full grin- we just want to be there and be seen-come what may.
I am glad i am off social networking now
Everyone is right here...but for me it is a fast way to help make someone else feel loved. I have had a hard time contacting people by phone, they are never home, this way at their leasure they can or cannot answer.
We as a family have seperated ourselfs with distance and basically this is free and convenient...Yes I agree some go to far but then I just don't bother to read them.
For me the computer has been a blessing, and since I waited till 4 yrs ago to get one I am amazed, and I am 70. Loved your hub my dear...:O) Hugs G-Ma
Amazing hub FP. I find it ridiculous when people post so many personal things as their status msg. Just goes to show how insecure they can be. But guess what that is da part of life now. Neways keep up the good work!! Cheers
Facebook was my first passion when I bought my first computer a year ago, F.P., but it did get pretty strange when people from my past 'found' me.
Some of those folks were of questionable character, so I decided to give the whole thing up. I mean, that's why they were in my past, for God's sake!
As you pointed out, HP is plenty public for me-relatively small and a lot more disciplined!
Great read and observations.
It took me years to have a FB page, and it was only because HP that I opened an account, to help promote my hubs. And that is about all I use it for.
Although some nice things have come about in that I have caught up with people whom I'd lost touch and occasionally we get together for lunch. That's the good part.
I do prefer Hubpages though, much more of a community, helpful spirit. I prefer my 'privacy' to a point.
Jewels - You are so right! A circus is what it is and we're all the clowns and performing monkeys! :)
saddlerider - I guess none of us is really immune to the lure of technology, but perhaps some discretion is recommended? I think it's good to maintain a little mystery about oneself. :D
Diana - It's ok to have too much to say as long as you're making sense. :)
ST - Vending machines for wine? I can just imagine the furor it would cause in a country like India where a lot of people guiltily sneak into wine shops to buy their daily tipple!
Just yesterday I was filling out a bank form and I was horrified at all the information they wanted - including my mother's maiden name! I think there's altogether too much private information out there - knowingly or unknowingly we've laid ourselves bare to the world.
DG - Obviously I had nothing to say for all of that month! And when I mentioned 'inanities' I was referring to my own! :D
It's great to be missed, but please don't try it yourself - we'd have a mutiny on our hands - all those deprived DG fans would protest LOUDLY! :)
Jaspal - Too much information is right. We really don't want to know some things!! When did discretion lose its cachet?
Neelesh - Some people live for the inanities that social networking sites provide!
G-Ma - Good to see you here! And the Internet has certainly made a difference to our lives. I'm not knocking it - just questioning the way some people use it. You, however, are an inspiration to us all! :)
Jay - It's part of life indeed! Thanks for reading. :)
lorlie - Haha, I know exactly how it feels when people you thought were better forgotten 'find' you on Facebook! I just ignore them shamelessly. :D
MPG Narratives - Facebook has its uses. It is a great way to catch up with people you might not be able to meet otherwise...and it has the option of private messaging so you don't have to make all your interactions public if you don't want to. Thanks for reading. :)
yup- frightening FP!! I'm sitting, I'm standing, I'm in a jam!!!!!!! who the heck wants to know? good read- something one has thought about ever so often!
Once upon a time I thought about joining Facebook but decided against it, especially when a good friend who had joined was trying to get out. Your hub convinced me I made the right decision. I am not interested in trivia, whether it be telling it or receiving it. Nor am I interested in seeing pictures of someone's grandchildren.
One of your comments was a bit frightening - the one about buying liquor from a machine. I also do not like the way we are treated at airports. A little old lady in a wheelchair gets body-scanned! Ridiculous!
Thought-provoking hub!
Interesting hub. It is in fact an information highway addressing every tic of the clock. We no longer sit on the parade route watching the pretty floats drive by, we in fact run among the truly wonderful things only to find the hum-drum that lerks there wishing they were part of something, not realizing they are the something...
Marshalling our written emotions can prove to be something of an art in itself!
Cool hub! Thanks!
billy - Good to see you! Thanks for reading. :)
mysterylady - It is frightening how much privacy we have lost in the name of progress. I guess it's up to us to preserve what we can. Thanks for stopping by. :)
K9keystrokes - Wise words indeed. And what an interesting name you have! :)
It has become an open world, or so it seems, Big Brother is very much out there but not at the request of any totalitairian Government....We are doing it to ourselves.
We are becoming like 24 hour news stations we have little to say an we take far too long saying it.
The frightening thing is that I'm sure the poloice and secret services of the world have an army of people watching Facebook and Twitter and all the others as a way of keeping up and knowing what's going on around them.
Have you noticed how many mobile phone videos end up on the news or in the newspapers ?
See a crime ? People these days don't call the police they call the Sun or Sky News....
Sad or what ?
Very sad indeed, Merlin. It's another distressing sign of the times...as if there aren't enough already!
Phew! I was also doing the same until my friend commented that I'm enjoying celebrity status at their cost. I just don't understand why only celebrities can Tweet each n everything.. :P :P :P
Hi, I am not a facebook type of person, i have an account just for my hub links, but I would like to say that it is great how we do make contact these days, but I remember recieving post cards etc and thinking how nice they were, also when we recieved letters they were so much more detailed without the drivel added! lol I do think that we have become too quick, especially if we forget to add something to the comment we make on a computer, letter writing is much more skilled and personal, cheers nell
I don't bother posting on facebook that I just ate lunch because I know nobody cares, the way I don't care about how bored someone is. It's funny, though, isn't it, that some people think their every thought and feeling and action is worth reporting. I don't want to be the one to break their bubble.
Haha, IdiotsDen, that's too bad for you! Maybe you can work on being a celebrity instead! :)
Hi Nell, those letter writing days were great! I used to wait anxiously for the postman to arrive everyday. The world of email has made us all more blase I think.
sheila - It's sad that many people mistake online interaction for life.
Thanks for reading, all of you! :)
Hey FP, am I glad you finally wrote, even if it is from your 5% quota!
Your profound statements are definitely always thought provoking, humorous and upbeat all at once!:)
You know I am a BIG fan of yours, no matter what/when you wish to air!:)
So...Just Say It!:)
Thank you Rashmi! :)
You're right, I find myself reading some of these update status's thinking, did they really just post that for everyone to read? There's a certain comfort I think we all have when we're sitting behing our keyboards and not interacting face to face. I hsve some friends of FB whom I can pretty much tell you what they ate and a rundown of where they've been for the past week all by their status. To each his own, it makes for some interesting entertainment at times. =)
cheryl - Yes it can be entertaining...till it gets plain annoying! Thanks for reading. :)
Face book and the rest of the internet gives people a false sense of being connected and staying in touch; in reality I belive we are more alone today then ever
Hi Petra, long time no see! That's an interesting observation you make...I guess eventually we are all quite alone. Everybody else has their own agendas.
It's a 'funny' word 'agenda' It has almost been turned into an expletive.
You are spot on my FFF, I find that FB is so intrusive. It seems to have lost the plot and can't decide what it wants to be. Lets hope that HP stays just the way it is but alas I feel that it will want to keep up with the 'Jones" or 'twitters' or 'FBs'.
Hail, oh noble fox...good to see you here! :)
And yes, you really can't take something like FB seriously. It hasn't yet discovered its own agenda. :D
This was funny feline! I enjoyed it LOL :-)
Thanks for reading, schoolgirlforreal! :)
I found 2 pen friends on FB. From about 40 years ago - yes, I belong to the dinosaur generation of paper and pencils and pen and pen friends! We took so much trouble to buy hand made paper, onion skin paper, specially coloured paper and what have you, collected our thoughts in an envelope which you couldn't stick by lick and posted it in the corner letter box. After which, we just waited and waited for the postman to return with a reply. We even embellished our envelopes with stickers and first day cover stamps. Then very very carefully removed the stamps we had received on envelopes meant for us and preserved them in our stamp albums. I even have some of the musty "hard copies" which give me as much pleasure now when I stumble upon them, as they did when I would wait for the impatiently for the postman and my reply! Quite a lot of exercise went into trying to connect! And it had its own charm!
What? What? Um.. excuse me.. were you saying something? My mind kinda wandered wondering what crops I have to harvest. Sorry. My bad!
Hello Tilottama, thanks for reading! What a great idea - why didn't I think of looking for old pen friends on FB as well...too bad I can't remember their full names! It was such fun to receive letters back in the old days. :)
Candie, good to see you here! We normally meet on FB! :D
Haha! or in the new tree! where ya been?
Candie, the tree is always ominously silent when I'm there...boohoo!
I will never understand why some people feel that everybody wants to read their comments about every little thing they do. "Its hot today, I think I'll go swimming." or "I'm feeling lazy today. I don't feel like doing laundry." Worse than these are the very personal, private things they will put out there for the world to read. Blogs is good for many things but private information shouldn't be one of them. Just my opinion. Geat hub
Unfortunately, nothing is sacred anymore! Thanks for stopping by KoffeeKlatch Gals! :)
Hi Feline,
Great hub you have here. You have excellent points here about people trying to keep up with their status, even if it is at other's expenses. I would say more but I think I should go tweet and let everyone on my list know that I am currently on HP, so they know where they can find me every moment of my life (he-he) ;O
Good to see you, Whikat! It's been ages...you really should do a better job of telling us where you are! :D
I am sitting here listening to beautiful music--a thousand thoughts going through my head like traffic and I too am stuck--I need to be somewhere right now--I should call someone first but the traffic here on this screen beckons and I think of how my mother and dad met via old fashioned letters, love letters kept yellowed in a box in the closet while someone sits in traffic frustrated and wants someone somewhere to care so that maybe one day in a computer folder there will be comments of love saved, musings answered, electronic romance and community...digital tapestry of hearts like yours FP sewn by zeroes and ones into mine. =:)
I not much use facebook. Many of the message I read on its pages are very few interesting to me, but in some cases also facebook can be a tool useful to sharing something stimulating, and to know other perso. In my experience, sooner or later, we all get bored of sharing everything and we begin to share just a few things and keep some others hidden. Maybe it is just then that we begin to use facebook with intelligence.
Winsome, that you can be poetic even in the midst of traffic is such a heartening thought! :)
fucsia - Using facebook with intelligence - that's an interesting thought! :)
Feline prophet, how now, can I respond?
Fear not, arb, if you have nothing to say! :D
I know exactly how you feel about this. One of my friends posted so often, I couldn't see anyone else's posts and people actually got "mad" at me for not commenting on their new pictures... it's become an obligation. I still write letters and when one my friends received a letter he told me to use e-mail to save money. Never mind the drawings, the newspaper clippings, about twenty pages of thoughts and ideas, no, it should have been e-mail. *shrug* People don't appreciate the effort anymore. They want fast, reliable e-mail. Even though their e-mail is normally spam anyways. Sometimes I have to urge to just give up writing letters at all.
Sometimes I will take lines out of my books and use them as my facebook status to see what people think of it. If ignored, I know to reword it a bit, if "liked" by a bunch of people, I know it works. It's a great editing tool.
I know what you mean, Phoebe. I have just one friend who still writes letters and sends them via snail mail with clipping from newspapers and other odds and ends he thinks I might enjoy reading - it's such a joy to receive a letter from him!
Thanks for reading and commenting. :)
Where is the poem?!
I am going to read more of your archived work. I forget I needn't wait for new hubs when the old remain relevant! This is very astute. At times I hub in this category of tmi, Jaspal has intimated. As a writer trying to write daily, personal subject matter can slog. Focussing on current events or other subject matter, poetry etc is my attempt to climb out of a rut!
Poem? You have to be joking!! :D
Thanks for reminding me of this hub, Storytellersrus...I'd forgotten I'd written it! Don't stop writing daily, even if you're sometimes lapsing into TMI - at least you're writing more than inane comments on hubs, as some of us have been reduced to!
VioletSun 22 months ago
FP: I am wondering if this technology which makes the world smaller is changing mankind somehow; perhaps influencing people to be less prejuidiced or judgemental as they make friends from someone in Shrangli-la and see where are just human beings. I am an optimist most of the time. :)
I joined Facebook, I believe this year, at the urguing a friend, and now I like it, but I hardly share anything way too personal, (unless its an inspirational hubpages article) having privacy matters to me, its my self respect.
Hey, I turned my comments into a musing; guess I had plenty to say. LOL.
Enjoyed reading you.