20 November 2008

I wrote to a friend who recently quit using Facebook to see how it was going. He wrote back saying, “Compared to the time I wasted on it, and its useless function as a mode for communication, there has been no drawback. The only thing that kept me there as long as I was, was addiction. I have more time to read, more time to keep in touch with real friends, more time to visit the coffee shop, more time to say prayers and enjoy breakfast, more time to think and ponder and enjoy the weather. I have been vindicated!”

I admire people who are able to do all those things and still manage to use the Facebook and read Twitters. I cannot. Have not. One by one I am letting go and learning to do without. Today I join my friend and quit Facebook. 

I suspect I’ll still use it vicariously through my wife, though. Why am I quitting? For reasons I have listed before, and for largely the same reasons my friend listed above. 

Khoi Vinh wrote recently about the necessity (the obligation, rather) of ‘interaction designers’ to fully engage the Social Internets. Now…I have a lot of respect for this man, but I disagree with his conclusion. It’s important to be more than just familiar with them, for the benefit of our clients, but I reject the notion that we need to fully embrace these ‘tools’ on a personal level.

Social Internets, as great as they can be, are for me a black hole of nothingness. They place importance on now. If you’ve missed something by a week or two days, it’s old news. It is, perhaps, these fleeting, right-now web apps that are proponents of ‘print is dead.’ It seems to me, rather, that print is what brings forth life.* And print, as it goes, is offline.

* I realize that’s a mouthful. I am mostly speaking about books in philosophy, theology, art history, etc. — ideas that have been around forever that aren’t going to be learned through cursory, virtual dialogue. The idea is to be equally (or more) connected with ancestors than contemporaries.

More and more, the Social Internets counter everything I want to do with my life, things which take time and long-term commitment. Some of them simple things like reading books, improving my penmanship, taking more photos, being more observant of life around me.

If “social media is the evolving, messy, inexorable and probably bright future of this business” as Khoi says, so be it. I don’t disagree with him there. If my clients want it, I’ll be glad to help. But, I want less and less of it in my personal life. And today is a big step in that direction.