online relationships

Social and Anti-Social

© Can Stock Photo / deandrobot

The 21st century forms of communication include social media. These venues, like Facebook and Twitter, feature the opportunity for interaction. Comments or replies, likes or favorites, those are the things that put “social” into social media.

Together with our blog site at 228Main.com and the weekly email newsletter, digital communications helped us stay connected with you when life was challenging. I’ll ever be grateful for being in the right place at the right time to use these methods to stay connected.

Social media can be a source of news and information and perspective. Experts in many fields are on Twitter and LinkedIn and Facebook. These are sources we did not have in the olden days.

But there is a dark side to social media. Some use their participation to send negative messages or say hurtful things, or promote stuff that just isn’t worthy of your attention. We’ve heard some say “Twitter is a cesspool” or “There is so much garbage on Facebook.”

The slang term for a person who posts objectionable viewpoints as comments on another’s post is “troll.” It may just be part of human nature, not a unique feature of social media. At the café, barbershop or salon there is also a mix of people with a mix of opinions and varying ways of expressing them.

But objectionable people and posts can be blocked or hidden on social media. Life is too short to pay attention to trolls. Blocking and muting are valuable skills you can use to keep your social media from being a ‘cesspool’ or full of garbage.

Nobody needs to be on social media to get our viewpoints, not with 228Main.com out there and the weekly email newsletter. But if you are on it, you are welcome to connect or follow. There are social media links on the home page of 228Main.com.

Clients, if you would like to talk about this or anything else, please email us or call.

The URL – IRL Connection

© Can Stock Photo / Bialasiewicz

… or, where the virtual world and the real world meet. We often talk about these two places as if we must choose one or the other. The reality is that the two work together in many ways.

Fans in stadiums root for their favorite team IRL (“in real life”), but they may also have a source for instant replays or play-by-play through a browser on their smartphones.

IRL, a grandparent plays with a grandbaby. But that grandparent may also enjoy seeing that baby between visits on social media or a photo-sharing site or some other URL—the address that connects them to a website.

And we see you at 228 Main in beautiful downtown Louisville, B’s Diner, or Round The Bend live and in person. But we’re also reaching you here at 228Main.com, plus social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

In other words, we lead integrated lives that combine the real world and a variety of virtual venues. It is not an either/or deal: we benefit when our lives have a home in both places!

It is worthwhile thinking about the advantages we derive from life in the 21st century. When we started communicating in new media, one client told us they would talk to us every day if they could, being interested in planning and investing. They knew that couldn’t happen. But they were delighted to find what we most wanted to say each day was online, plus in these three-minute essays twice each week.

A key advantage of these virtual venues: they do not require each of us to be available at exactly the same time. Nobody plays “phone tag” on Twitter. We frequently post updates early in the morning, but you can read them at your leisure or even on another day. And each of you may choose how much or how little you want.

That client and I still meet; we still have lunch together. And our real-world conversations start warmer and go deeper and farther than before—because of all we share in the virtual world.

Clients, if you would like to talk about this in any world, email us or call.

The opinions voiced in this material are for general information only and are not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual.