I have a friend, I’ll call her Mrs. X because if I used her real name, I think she would come after me and I really don’t want that. This is an actual friend and our families eat lunch together after church most Sundays and generally at the same restaurant.
Somehow, we began discussing Facebook and the whole social networking thing and Mrs. X had no desire to participate in that realm and she didn’t understand it. We discussed it and I shared a little more about what the appeal was to me and also the way that you only put out there what you want others to know.
The reality is that Mrs. X is a private person and she doesn’t want to put everything about her life ‘out there‘ on display for everyone to see. She really didn’t understand why I do it on this blog or anywhere else, nor did she understand what the appeal was.
This conversation ties back exactly to my recent post where I talk about the blank stares that I get when talking to people about social networking. One thing that I failed to mention that some commenters pointed out is that the younger generations get it, it’s us old folks that don’t get it.
Through the course of lunch, I explained that you only put ‘out there‘ what you want known by strangers. I started my blog completely anonymous and over the years, became basically transparent, to a point.
By the time lunch was over, I challenged Mrs. X to go sign up at Facebook and give it a shot. So, we’ll see, it will be interesting. I told her I might get her a few new friends if she wanted me to.
Wanna take part in a social experiment to see if we can raise up a skeptical social networker?
Technology evangelism! Heheh…I love it. I don’t think she needs a friend in L.A., but I will be interested to see how your experiment turns out.
I’d be her friend. Mrs. X sounds just like my mother-in-law. I wish I could get her to try it out. She has a MySpace, but she has it so no one but family can see it and she still won’t put up anything.