This morning I had breakfast with a friend.
We first met through social media circles and keep up to date on each other’s lives in that way. I see updates on Twitter and Flickr, and we read each other’s blogs. All this great technology allows us to keep updated with everyone. All I have to do in the morning is open up my Socialthing Lifestream, and I can feel connected with people around the globe.
But it has been on my mind a lot lately how we are becoming more connected virtually, but we mustn’t forget the physical connection that we need to maintain. Sitting down today over cups of coffee and plates of yummy breakfast goodness, we got to talk, connect and share in a way that no social network is ever going to allow.
Communities start as small as one-on-one and can grow to thousands of people. I have lots of small cluster communities that are based on friendships, professional connections or even because our kids go to the same school. So many of these don’t overlap each other. So many could and should intersect, and yet there is not much out there to help pull these connections together.
Don’t forget the real world. Don’t forget what it really means to hang out with friends.
Why don’t you schedule getting together for breakfast or drinks with someone right now? It’s OK if you send him or her a direct message on Twitter to do it. *grin*
This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 20th, 2008 at 7:28 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.2 Responses to “Community Over Coffee”
Leave a Reply
May 22nd, 2008 at 8:30 am
CC, agreed 100%. Social networking, and emailing shouldn’t take the place of the good old face to face conversation. There are obvious huge advantages to the fruits of the digital age. However one big disadvantage I see with it is when it’s used for dealing with confrontation. When people use email instead of being in person to deal with an issue, the email only complicates the issue being communicated further. Without the face to face, each party cannot see the facial expressions, body language, feel the energy from one another, it can amplify a situation from bad to worse. We’ve all experienced it. So in the long run, what’s a tougher situation- dealing with confrontation via email, or face to face?
Marshall O’Brien
http://www.c3teambuilding.blogspot.com
http://www.c3teambuilding.com
June 10th, 2008 at 9:22 pm
I know, I love connecting electronically, too…but I make sure that I have a couple of days a week of face to face contact. Same goes for networking…a mix of electronic and in person seems to be best…