I have been using social networks so long now I cannot even remember when it started. This is kind of unusual as I am not a hugely social person in "real life". I began by creating a webpage to deliver course handouts and using email to contact with my students when I was a graduate teaching assistant. This lead to a gig as a webmaster for the Biology Department and gave me an excuse to play around with new technologies. I was on AOL Instant Messaging (AIM) very early even though I did not have any friends using it. I had a Myspace page before it was cool, and dumped it before it was uncool, again with no friends with which to share posts. Same with Twitter, Facebook, Friendfeed, Posterous, Google Wave and numorous other services. So now that age has continued moving along and my friend-base has grown only slightly, what about now?
Some people try to hold on to their youth by taking part in current trends, but what many kids/teens/young adults fail to realize is current trends are not as new as they think. Facebook is cool now (does anyone say "cool" anymore?)so students giggle when I announce that I can be reached on Facebook, but I was on facebook while most of these students were in middle or high school. This semester the giggles were for my new point of contact via text messaging. Now granted, I also laugh at the old lady in Walmart trying to text on that tiny flip phone, but could I be that little old lady to the current generation of students?
Many of my students have become facebook friends and some have even remained so long after the course is over. If you take away family and real friends from my friends list, the majority of the list remains. These students, former students and high school acquaintances make it look like I have friends, but again I am a mostly nonsocial creature.
My Twitter feeds go largely unread, few if any comments are seen on my facebook, dust bunnies are collecting on my Flickr feed and do I really care? NO! I have a voice in the world even though I am shouting in the wind of the world's shouting. Getting my thoughts off my chest is good therapy even if noone reads it and that is good enough for me. If those few that do happen across my ramblings and are entertained or informed, that's jsut gravy.
My students do not IM me anymore, there are no new Facebook friends this semester and the phone barely rings. It is a sign of the times as old technology leave us (goodbye Google Wave)and new technology emerges (hello mobile phones)that those of us geeky enough to want to stay up to date, in spite of our older age, must continue to persevere even if we are beseeched by giggles.
As for this blog, it is time to wipe away the cobwebs and centralize my utterances especially in a time where Twitters are wormed and Facebooks are less and less secure, at least until the next new technology is born.
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