Why Aren't You Talking To Me?

This afternoon my best friend Steffen called me. The first thing I said was, "Hey! What have you been up to the past couple of weeks?" As be began to tell me, it surprised me how strange it felt having to ask him that question.

If the laws of chance should flip on their heads, and I would bump into Jeffrey Zeldman on the street tomorrow, I'd ask him, "How's your dog doing?" If Jason Santa Maria were with him I'd say, "Dude, killer relaunch. " Derek Powazek's in town? "Damn, I'd love to get some of that heat over here."

These three are all web celebrities - let's call them blebrities - but I've never met a single one of them. I follow them on Twitter, so every day I have the feeling of looking through a pinhole at their lives, even though they wouldn't know me from a hole in the wall. We're continually in touch (even if it's one-way) and they therefore have a kind of daily presence in my life. We all know how this works, so I won't waste any more time on it.

But what's this do for my meatspace friends? Steffen (the poor bastard) is part of the "don't get it" crowd and isn't on Twitter, or anything else online that we call social. He writes emails (rarely) and calls me occasionally. Although he's one of my favourite people in the world, and we have a great time together when we see each other once a month, I know less about what's he's doing every day than I know about any number of people I've never met who're sitting on the other side of the world.

And sadly, although my emotional impulse is to avoid this reaction, I have to admit that Steffen's becoming less relevant in my life. I miss him.

Typically, someone who doesn't "get" Twitter, would stare at me in shocked horror if I told them this, but the fact is, Twitter and other online social tools have made it possible for me to have a kind of light, continuous contact with so many people, and this contact has become an essential part of my life. If those people are meatspace friends, it intensifies the relationship and saves us both time. Instead of asking them, "what have you been up to?" when we see each other I can say, "I don't really like it either," and without explanation we both know what we're talking about. Meatspace friends who aren't online are a conspicuous absence.

In a way that I myself find completely unfair and strange, I'm starting to resent Steffen's non-participation, as in, "dude, why aren't you talking to me?" As Jyri Engstrom said in an interview with the BBC,

Being-hyper connected will become a precondition for citizenship.

In the same way mobiles are a necessity, in five years time being hyper-connected will become a necessity to be an active participant in the social world.

Sure, there are still some curmudgeons who still refuse to own a mobile phone, but they're seen as stubborn outsiders. I'm looking forward to the certain future when hyperconnectivity is the norm, and I can help, soothe, laugh at and commiserate with all of my friends, whenever and wherever we are.

Even Steffen.

Comments

[Rashunda]

Even though I do appreciate the usefulness of Twitter and such in terms of connecting online, for me, there's no substitute for sitting down with a friend and having a cup of tea. I have offline friends who by choice are not using the social media apps of the day and I respect their right to do so. Having offline friends creates a balance and keeps me from being sucked into the echo chamber.

Social media tools are wonderful and I love them, but to think that most of my communication in the future may come without the touch of a hand, a hug or a kiss frightens me.

[Justin Foster]

Stowe - I love this post! I actually heard someone say the other day that the people that we know from Facebook, Twitter, et al. are not "real" relationships. This is crazy, of course. Twitter, in particular, is the closest thing to a true "relationship management" tool - primarily because it is about conversations, not just contact. I have also become a fan of BrightKite - which bridges the gap to spontaneous face-time. Now back to pretending that I "know" Stowe Boyd :)

[Rahsheen Porter]

This is almost exactly how it goes with my friends. I would even take it a step further and say that I have less "meatspace" friends because they are just too damned hard to keep up with. Out of site, out of mind.

[Lakshmi Mareddy]

Stowe I tried plugging in a trackback [http://www.typepad.com/t/trackback/1343/30412364], but am getting XML errors :(
So here is a link to my article, in response to your article..

[Jim]

I have to say, your last statement is, indeed, strange and unfair. What's wrong with picking up a phone? It's the most ubiquitous communication device on the planet that isn't a body part. If Steffen is indeed a "best friend" isn't it worth it to contact him using a tool he's comfortable using? If not...if Twitter and similar tools are so essential to your life that you feel you have more meaningful connections with people online than you do in person...can you really say this person is your friend? The onus isn't on them to "get it," dude. It's ok to reach out and touch the ones you love...by whatever means necessary.

[Matt Balara]

[Seems to be some confusion. I wrote this post, not Stowe. I'm guest-blogging on /message, and usually blog over here.]

@Rashunda of course there's nothing like a long chat over some tea (or a beer)! I don't wish to ever replace meatspace contact with social media. But my meatspace friends that *are* on Twitter are far more present in my life on a daily basis. Steffen and I are both busy guys and have been trying to get together for 3 weeks now. In that 3 weeks I've heard from plenty of folks online, but little from Steffen. As I said, I miss him, and would miss him less if I had a little bit of contact with him online.

@Jim I have the feeling you missed my point. It's not that I "have more meaningful connections with people online". Steffen is and always will be more important to me than Zeldman or whoever. Online's just another channel which expands my contact with people I know offline. Since Steffen and I manage so rarely to see each other, I'd feel more in touch with him if he were online. I wish for "also" but never "instead".

[washwords]

I love this and just subscribed to you. I have been thinking about this myself so much lately, battling questions like "do I go public or stay (quasi)anonymous on my blog and messaging sites?" and how do I separate my facebook/twitter/friendfeed "friends" from my "real" friends (after someone in the latter category took it upon himself to "friend" all my REAL friends, well, actually only all my pretty female real friends. eek.) I realize sometimes when I meet up with my boyfriend at the end of a work day, I too am asking him things farrrr more general than I am my twitterfriends, and sometimes I can't believe how behind he is on my minute-by-minute happenings! heh.

anyway, thanks for raising the questions, reminding us of "there's friends and there's FRIENDS." washwords

[Rashunda]

@Matt -> I understand your point. It's just that, and again, this is just me, there's only so much I share with *anyone* that I know only online. And if I do share online, it's only with one or two people. I open up more in front of a person. So, in terms of my "online friends," they only know half of the soap opera that is my life.:-) As for my "meatspace" friends that are online also, the same is true. We may make contact on Twitter, but the real sharing happens when we meet.

[Matt Balara]

I experienced another great example of online/offline social overlap this morning. A co-worker who twitters asked me how I’m doing. “Tired,” I replied. All she said was, “Jericho?”

[Michael Craig]

I really resonated with your comments in this post. It makes total sense that we feel that people are "in our lives" to the degree with which we have conversations with them, or at least input, it makes perfect sense. The actual artifacts of our relationships are the communications we have with those people (verbalized and otherwise)...