The Geekiness of My Lifestyle

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I have fun with technology which means that I spend a lot of time online as a result of which I enjoy creating online friendships. The advantage of that is that wherever I am in the world I have people to chat with, or so I thought. I am taking a break from one social network in particular because I am no longer gaining from that social network.

It was never about more than developing interesting friendships with interesting people and this was fine when I lived in a city where everyone used the site. The problem is when you move to a place where there are fewer geeks. The social media require one very important character trait for success. That the user is not stigmatized as being geeky.

This comment comes after reading facebook statususes. One person said they were online at six am, second person replied "dweeb". Of course this is playful but below the surface that attitude is very strong within contemporary culture. Spending too much time socialising in social media labels you as a geek.

Social media will never be social whilst people still think of conversing with people online as geeky. Social networks will never be strong until people drop the stigma of being geeky and embrace a new way of doing things.

Mobile technology is evolving the right way with so many social media networks developing their services for people to carry with them at all times. For the moment business professionals have blackberries and geeks like me have a diversity of smart phones. In two to three years when smart phones become more affordable then the stigma of being social online will weaken. It's at that point that social media will hep improve your social life, rather than run along side it.