The Not so Social Network

Social Networking or is it not so social networking. The world has never been smaller or, should I say, connected as it is today.

You can share things with millions of people at a go of a button. They say social media has given people the power. While this is quite true in many cases but there is a darker side to this thing also. So many times I see people put stuff on the internet that shouldn't have been there in the first place. Like the case of the girl who put her Halloween pic dressed as the Boston Marathon Bomb Victim. That post earned her quite a bad reputation. She got death threats, hate comments and what not. She even got fired from her job. If she didn’t had put it on the internet, maybe the worst thing that would have happened was that she would have been scolded by her friends but the social network messed things up for her. She didn't want to hurt anyone's feelings but people judge by what they see and what she had shown was not good. Whatever is on the internet, is on there forever. You can still see the things even after decades. Internet has a very sharp memory.

Social Networking sites are mostly popular with teens. They want to feel connected yet stay disconnected from the real world. I often see people on their phones texting to someone millions of miles away while ignoring the very people sitting right next to them. The thought of staying away from their phones will scare the hell out of some people. People are connected in the virtual world but disconnected in the real world. Sometimes, I wonder is this virtual world the new Real world? People are talking to other people whom they have never even met in real life. I mean, how do you know that the person who you are talking to is really the person that you think he/she is? It can be someone entirely different.

So many people say that they have got hooked to this networking. They can’t stay away even if they want. Playing candy crush on facebook began as fun but I have seen people who are only discussing candy crush all the time.  People are always checking what others are doing because everyone is putting everything on the networking sites. Then there is this thing. Putting status up for people who don’t even have accounts on those websites, rather than saying things directly to them. Most recently, I saw so many people wishing their Mom a happy mother’s day on facebook while their Mom’s didn’t even have the facebook account.  It’s difficult to know what image you’re presenting, who’s looking and what they’re taking from it.

People fighting each other on facebook posts and twitter tweets has become one of the most stupid things that I see out there. The two people who probably don’t know a thing about each other are threatening each other and shouting abuses at each other.  

                                 

One of the most irritating that I find is people putting pics of everything that they eat, on the internet. It is like they are buying food to put it on the web and show off to their so called friends. What happened to the time when people used to enjoy a good meal together?  It is so annoying.

Oh, I almost forgot about the people who post way too much, like seriously, way too much. They are posting everything from going to take a bath to taking a shit. They are like broadcasting their life to everyone but guess what no one cares, so stop posting such stuff and get a life.

The benefits of the social networking hugely outweigh the side effects.  Use wisely and live well.