Social Networking : Are we closer or has it distanced us?

Every kid in secondary school now has an account or Orkut or Facebook. If you don’t you’re considered outcast, weird or just internet-illiterate. Right now social networking is the new drug, it’s the latest addiction, the latest universal pandemic.

I remember the first social network I was a part of was way back in (I think) the 7th standard, when I was about 6 years underage. It was Orkut. I don’t know how I joined it. Back in school the only emails I would get were spam. I never remember getting any interesting or important ones and then suddenly I get this invite for Orkut. So I joined and hence I was inducted into the world of social friendship. Gradually like everything I ‘upgraded’ into the more chic facebook created by the Harvard graduate student Mark Zuckerberg, So it all started by an Orkut invite when in school and now here I am, in my first year of college spending almost an hour daily on facebook.

So now exactly what is a social network?

Well the broad aim of a social network according to me is to bind together public who share common interests and thought around the world. It acts as a free platform to interact, discuss, argue and share thoughts, ideas, stories and what not at the click of the mouse. Generally all such networks are web based and all require the internet. They work alongside emails and instant messaging, but the social networks have been successful in making networking more interesting than sharing emails or IM’ing between friends.

Now why do you think Facebook, Twitter (a micro-blog, not a social network as such) and Orkut are so popular ?

For one simple reason. These three are easy, stylish and in the terms of the youth – Cool. Social networking sites have created a great impact on today’s internet literate population in India and all over the world. It has created a new wave of internet users who simply log onto the World Wide Web to tweet, or to update their Facebook status.  This is the stylish part of it. Updating your Twitter account every five minutes and letting your friends and family what you’re doing by telling them where you had dinner and where you’re going for some ice cream is the part which appeals as ‘cool’ to all of us youngsters. It makes you known in your social circle. Well at least we all try. You make your own niche with your Facebook profile in the world of social networking. It becomes sort of your pseudo identity.

As for the easy part of social networking, it takes not more than 24 hours to understand and start exploiting the nuances and subtleties of the networking sites. Within a day one’s profile is complete and he or she becomes an active member of the site. Just like the million others and the million yet to join.

So today there are basically two identities each person is trying to maintain side-by-side. One out there, in the actual physical world: in school, college, at work, on the field and so on. The other is in front of the computer screen ahead of the keyboard, constantly typing and uploading; the ultimate ending would be to strike a perfect balance between the two. That would mean making sure both the identities are identical. Not a tad different. Someone shouldn’t be shocked looking at both and saying, ‘Is that really you?’ There should be the perfect balance and both the identities should match. Surely, it’s easier said than done!

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