Facebook is a degeneration of the way we interact. It has none of the subtlety, granularity, and beauty of real-life, real-time socializing. Yet a generation of youths is learning to socialize, and generation of adults re-learning to socialize, under this paradigm.
The ideal social network should enhance real life social interactions, not supplant them. It should be disconcerting that entire conversations, engagement announcements, and even break-ups are occurring within the confines of Facebook that would have otherwise occurred in that ruthless, real time, highly evolved place known as the offline world.
To make matters worse, the interactions are highly structured, and limited to the semantics of the interface. Whereas a flirtation in old society was a subtle signal, which could take forms limited only by the scope of our imagination and social savvy; a flirtation on Facebook can be pursued in a delineated fashion: Facebook message, write on the wall, “poke”, or _____________ (insert next such feature).
The social network as it is conceived online today, gives us far more information about more people than we possibly could gather alone, yet it precludes us from truly learning about any. Essentially we have traded years of trial and error within civilizations for a rather binary and limited system. The upshot is that now you can quickly “engage” with 400 people all around the world, something simply impossible under old paradigm (save for un-spendable wealth, uncountable minions, or infinite time).
Ask yourselves and others a question: which is a better goal in social interacting for the purposes of developing meaningful relationships: A) Quantity or B) Quality? Invariably, the response will be “quality” and with good reason. Some may respond “quality” out of aspiration because it is what they themselves desire, or perhaps out of self-interest because they (correctly) intuit that it is the tactful response. The majority would respond so because they have learned over time that it is those few relationships with depth, borne of meaningful social interaction that truly meant a thing when push came to shove. Conversely, those relationships conceived during trivial interaction, more than being liable to disappear at the drop of a hat, likely never even existed.
The Facebook is a wonderful tool for some. It offers the Socially Inept a panoply of tools to trivially interact with just about anyone in the world. Indeed, this is the Socially Inept’s fantasy. Access to nearly anyone alive (or dead in the case of infrequently updated profiles) at the touch of a button.
It is easy. Concocting an interesting approach is no longer needed. Neither is taking the learnable risks that real socializing entails. Just type in the person’s name and click “add as a friend” and wait. Don’t remember the person’s name? There are dozens of other ways to search, that even have the aid of a picture. If your approach is rebuked, your ego will remain intact. You’d never know about it unless you were constantly checking to see if they finally “added you”. You even have the option of telling yourself that it must have been looked over or that he/she just hasn’t gotten to it yet. In fact, you can dilute the “risk to ego” by adding so many people that you couldn’t even keep track of it all. Yet isn’t “risk to ego” the precept that motivates people to learn how to socialize successfully?
The world needs a social tool that enables and enhances real-life socializing. A service that does not impinge on traditional socializing in any way; but instead enhances it by way of opportunity set, relevance and quality.