I’m alone in Commons. People pass me by, some stare, some glance, some don’t notice me. I have a relatively blank expression on my face, and I am aware that in today’s post-columbine society, looking like a loner is cause for speculation. More stares, longer glances, but then,I pull out my blackberry. And suddenly they stop. I’m no longer dining alone at Commons, I’m now enthralled in a hilarious debate with my friends via twitter; or emailing my advisor or even texting my mother. Manuel Castells author of "A Mobile Network Society" describes this unique and relatively new phenomena “Relentless Connectivity”
I understood this to mean that mobile communication is no longer about being able to carry your connection to the Internet around with you. It’s the fact that if you do so you’re permanently and instantly connected to various social networks. It’s no longer about how far you can go, but rather, how close can you stay. This ideal is somewhat of a double edged sword. How close is too close?
This has to be one of the biggest moral dilemmas of my generation. How much is too much? Do we really need to know “25 things about you”? Do you feel safe releasing every bit of information about yourself to the World Wide Web for millions of strangers to read? Just how involved are you in your real life, if you spend more time posting statues about what you’re doing than actually doing it? Being relentlessly connected makes the wireless user feel trapped in between two worlds, the real and the virtual.
With the introduction of Skype and Oovoo, this line is almost erased. Now everyone across the nation can get that desperately needed face time. Can’t afford to fly Grandma half way across the country so that she can witness little Jimmy’s first Halloween costume, Skype her. Not at a laptop or desktop? Skype her from your iphone4! While this relentless connectivity can be a beautiful thing, it can also be a horrible one. Now we will have more and more people taking their online lives, one step farther. That Facebook lover, that can’t seem to see you person, can now skype you. Close enough right? Wrong.
As the internet and mobile phones become interchangeable we find ourselves falling deeper and deeper into a social trap. While I agree with Castells belief that wireless connectivity should be available for everyone, because the Internet is a necessity, I fear the inevitable degradation of our culture’s socialization skills if mobile Internet connectivity replaces our ability to communicate the old fashioned way; which was Face to face, or now, on the phone. Pretty soon we’ll have to worry about Internet viruses as much as we do the AIDS virus. Because if a social networking site was to go down, how would anyone get in touch with anyone? How would a new friend be made if you weren’t able to find out their likes and dislikes on twitter first? What’s a “handshake”, can’t I just poke you, like on Facebook?
In conclusion, while I have my doubts about the future of social norms in relation to a mobile network society, I still hope for a counter-culture revolution, that understands the situation we are putting ourselves in.
“With the diffusion of wireless access to the Internet, and to computer networks and information systems everywhere, mobile communication is better defined by it’s capacity for ubiquitous and permanent connectivity rather than by its potential mobility.”
I understood this to mean that mobile communication is no longer about being able to carry your connection to the Internet around with you. It’s the fact that if you do so you’re permanently and instantly connected to various social networks. It’s no longer about how far you can go, but rather, how close can you stay. This ideal is somewhat of a double edged sword. How close is too close?
“One consequences of this development is that traditional norms of courtesy have to be redefined in the new context….a new m-etiquette is struggling to be adopted, specifying when it is proper to isolate oneself from the social environment and when it is not, when it is acceptable to expose one’s personal life and when it is not.”
This has to be one of the biggest moral dilemmas of my generation. How much is too much? Do we really need to know “25 things about you”? Do you feel safe releasing every bit of information about yourself to the World Wide Web for millions of strangers to read? Just how involved are you in your real life, if you spend more time posting statues about what you’re doing than actually doing it? Being relentlessly connected makes the wireless user feel trapped in between two worlds, the real and the virtual.
With the introduction of Skype and Oovoo, this line is almost erased. Now everyone across the nation can get that desperately needed face time. Can’t afford to fly Grandma half way across the country so that she can witness little Jimmy’s first Halloween costume, Skype her. Not at a laptop or desktop? Skype her from your iphone4! While this relentless connectivity can be a beautiful thing, it can also be a horrible one. Now we will have more and more people taking their online lives, one step farther. That Facebook lover, that can’t seem to see you person, can now skype you. Close enough right? Wrong.
As the internet and mobile phones become interchangeable we find ourselves falling deeper and deeper into a social trap. While I agree with Castells belief that wireless connectivity should be available for everyone, because the Internet is a necessity, I fear the inevitable degradation of our culture’s socialization skills if mobile Internet connectivity replaces our ability to communicate the old fashioned way; which was Face to face, or now, on the phone. Pretty soon we’ll have to worry about Internet viruses as much as we do the AIDS virus. Because if a social networking site was to go down, how would anyone get in touch with anyone? How would a new friend be made if you weren’t able to find out their likes and dislikes on twitter first? What’s a “handshake”, can’t I just poke you, like on Facebook?
In conclusion, while I have my doubts about the future of social norms in relation to a mobile network society, I still hope for a counter-culture revolution, that understands the situation we are putting ourselves in.
“It becomes increasingly clear, by looking at patterns of social use, that the true convergence of wireless communication and the Internet will be the critical question in the next phase of the information Age.”Castells Manuel, "A Mobile Society", Communication in History Sixth Edition 2011
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