Good morning, World! Or should I say, Hello? A brief note, this is not about information security. It is more about information and how our world has shifted in the way that we share it.
Recently I have had the good fortune to speak at a few conferences and to sit down with other speakers and really talk. We didn’t discuss our talks, we discussed life and ideas. I was able to spend dinner with one colleague and speaker two nights in a row at the most recent event and our conversations drifted from work, to life, to faith and ideas on religion and humanity. It really impressed upon me the importance of in person communication and thoughtful conversation. My mind and heart were opened and I was able to really understand where this person was coming from and reflect on my life as well.
This morning, I decided against getting on Facebook. Stay with me, these thoughts are connected. I am tired of the false communication and false closeness social media promises. It wears me out. We have this fake connection to our “friends” but not in any truly meaningful way. It is funny to see how many of my friends I wouldn’t be friends with if I had met them through social media. One of the reasons for this, at least in my mind, is that we see little half thoughts. Little snippets of a false personality that we all show to the world through social media channels. There is no way to share, because it is all projection, our true selves. There is no way to really know someone through social media.
I am going to try my own social experiment and be truly social (he says as he types into his blog), and try to not communicate through memes and links, and sound bites. Sound bite friendships aren’t enough for me. I want to really communicate with people and to expand myself by really learning about them. In my mind’s eye, I see an old, English club where people sit around in leather chairs, drinking whiskey, smoking tobacco pipes and discussing the Universe.
Time to go build a time machine…
