While driving to work today El and I were listening to one of the local radio personalities talk about how she hasn't had a proper date since she moved to Charleston over a year ago. She only had one and as luck would have it she didn't have a second with the person. The real issue she explained was that the dating scene has changed so much in recent years. People have short attention spans and have lost a certain ability to socialize in a more appropriate manner. She was blown off by her date explaining he had forgotten the time and date of them meeting for dinner or whatever and could they just meet on a Sunday night instead. She said "hell no" - good for her. As she rambled on about the details and her thoughts on the whole dating scene Eleanor and I discussed how we have heard this same experience from another friend of ours recently.
I have always thought that society's inability to properly interact with one another has been because of the internet and being plugged in too much. Match.com, eHarmony, Facebook, smartphones, iPads, Twitter, LinkedIn. They're all to blame. Everyone has gotten so reliant on these social media networking sites they've forgotten how to actually go out and meet with other people to get to know them. Snap judgements are made based on what you look like on Facebook, what you're credentials are on LinkedIn, what you tweet about. It's terrible. You have to literally put your whole life online now to be judged in a few minutes by a complete stranger.
Recently I submitted a portfolio to an agency by actually printing one and walking my ass there and introducing myself to them. I apologized for my unscheduled visit, but felt compelled to actually introduce myself to them like the good ol' days. Her response? A nice and refreshing touch. WOW.
We put too much emphasis on our online persona we seem to have lost our persona. I've read alot recently about how hard it is to even get a confirmation from anyone hiring that they've even received your resume or portfolio via email. What happened to professional courtesy nowadays? The tell us to be sure to send a thank you email after an interview, but that's only IF you even get that far. For the most part people in the articles complained about how impersonal everything feels now. I couldn't agree more.
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2 comments:
We definitely need to unplug. I believe that social media, in the same manner as its rise in popularity, will flame out the same way.
Online manners are sometimes atrocious. Online "friends", for many, are still second-class acquaintances compared to your friends in "meat-space".
I've reduced my online presence lately, having nuked Google+, disabled Facebook, unsubscribed from dozens of RSS feeds and have long ago stopped blogging.
I'm now down to conventional email, Twitter (and set to private too) and a handful of newsworthy RSS feeds.
Next up: Dare I unplug AIM and Yahoo?
Hard to say if it will flame out. I know there are quite a few people sick of social anything, but I doubt it will be going anywhere anytime soon. Old school, principled cats like us will be left behind I imagine. Everything now seems catered to the younger, more plugged in generation (for better or worse). In 10 more years they'll be labeled the old school cats bemoaning the loss of the early Facebook days...
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