Are you frustrated watching the younger generation
attached to what seems every waking hour of the day attached to the appendage
of their mobile device or wonder at their ability to be glued to the magic
screen of the computer or any other gismo that gives them access to the
worldwide web?
Then you may well come from a generation that used phones
at the bottom of the road and when you wanted to know something you either
asked somebody or went to the local library. Failing that you had a quill and
ink or equivalent and wrote a letter to a person or sent a card. Letters to
family in Australia could takes months and a response well who knows.
Nothing has changed so fast and so dramatically in the
last 100 and more years than that which has developed in the past 20 so far as
communication technology. The ultimate intrusion to our calm ordered lives
which has seen the development of the Instant
Age – Instant Coffee – Instant Tea – Ready Meals – Instant Porridge.
Actually few people now know the rudiments of cooking or care that much and now
we have a generation who either do care or don’t care about this new era. One thing is for sure communication and the
speed at which it can be transferred is NOT going to go away. So if you think
that by putting your head in the sand hoping it will pass you by, then think
again –
Somebody somewhere,
is or has been talking about YOU on the Internet whether you are part of it or
not or whether you like it or not.
So maybe you do remember how you used to meet people or
engage with them. This would depend on whether you categorised them as friends
– acquaintances – business related connections or other. At school you had
class mates – some you liked some you didn’t. The same applied to work
colleagues. Then you might have met fellow parents on the school run or people
in the park whilst walking the dog. The engagements with people varied. Some
endure and some move on and past by – some we contact at Christmas or just once
a year. Either way these people have played a part in our lives in some way or
other.
How many of us have been asked if they knew of somebody
who did decorating or plumbing. Have you given a name or a contact that was
familiar to you? One of the ways the freemasons worked – knowing a fellow
colleague ‘on the square’ and recommending them to another brother. This is
categorised now as ‘Networking’ or
as Deborah Kerr sang ‘Getting to Know
You’ – ‘Being Social’
Many have lived with colour television - some can
remember black and white and some crystal radios. An AGE not so many years ago in the history of the world but an AGE away from what we have now and of
no interest to the young of today who have no time for such stories or
nostalgia.
We have brought them up in the Instant Age and yet some if us refuse or have chosen not to join
them and enjoy the benefits of it.
Engagement with another person involves dialogue. Some
stories you tell some you keep secret. Some you share, some you don’t, some of
it is gossip or hearsay or tittle tattle it is like that and nothing more. At
the end of the day much of it doesn’t really matter unless it is factual or
relevant to the person/persons in receipt.
Regrettably one
skill we seem to have lost not only in this but many other applications of life
and that is Etiquette or having consideration and respect for our fellow
beings.
So maybe my waffling has gone on enough but now we have
to introduce Media - a tool of
communication. Whether Television, Radio, Newspapers or Cinema. These are all
ways that we receive information and some of it is intrusive some of it we
ignore. Most of this we just go along with and have no recourse or ability to
respond on whether we like it or not – it is a one way flow of
traffic........................
NOW let’s add SOCIAL
into the equation and put MEDIA to
that. We get the application of the earlier paragraphs and add the later ones
and arrive at SOCIAL MEDIA – Communication in both directions over the
Internet.
The Internet is a library of information which has very
few boundaries. Just type in your name on one of the many search engines and
see what turns up – you will be amazed or even shocked at what you see or find.
Our minds are a catalogue of enquiry and questions absorbing information
constantly and now it is all at our finger tips 24 hours a day.
Communication with family across the globe is a mere
press of a button and with cam cameras you can actually see each other too. In
addition you have all this facility too in the palm of your hand if you have
one of the new generations of ‘Smart ‘mobile phones.
Where will it all take us I am sure we all wonder – but
the technology continues to develop and is so far limitless. The old TV series
of space age imagined gismos are now a reality and will continue to be for
sure.
So in conclusion.
Do not expound
your thoughts on Social Media if you don’t understand it – be honest and admit
you don’t.
Do not dismiss it
– over 800 million people around the world are using it. The highest users
at present average age are about 35 – the next growth area is expected to be
the older generations as they grasp the concept.
Do not enter into
or start a site – before you do some research and get some advice or
information of what to do or not to do.
Do not talk about
the wrongs of it –until you have set up your choices, security settings and
your preferences, correctly.
Do not put things
– on the site that might offend others or cause controversy or that you
might regret late in life
And most importantly
Do not let this
wonderful world of technology pass you by....LEARN and don’t stagnate or become
a crusty old dinosaur and become extinct.
