Microcosms of Intelligence

Looking back on my blogging practice over the last few weeks, I can only state that it is dismal.  When Dr. Burton asked us in class to do a reflective post on the blogs we've written lately, the only posts I could fall back on were 3 blogs I wrote in early January, 3 drafts that I never finished, and two pages of written ideas that I wrote on paper and never transferred onto the internet.  Not much to refer to, however, I managed to find one word that kept cropping up: "connecting".  It seems that I am rather obsessed with the topic of how to hook people together, and create microcosms of intelligence.  Let me walk you through what I mean.



My first post, Intentional Illiteracy, gave an overview of my history in technology.  I am well experienced, but have reached a point in my life where I spurn most social media because it seems to drive me away from in person communication and distance me from people, rather than strengthen my relationships with others.  Interestingly I am also in a computer-related field, and most of society expects me to have social media connections, so I have to balance being left out of the loop with being lost in the internet.  My conclusion was to try an experiment of being connected with a group of academic people (namely my Civ class) who used social media for purposes other than stalking each other, and see how often I could bring myself to contribute.  Unfortunately, this lead me to being swamped by the sheer volume of information published in a short time, and mystified by the nebulous natured class goals which supposedly directed what I was to do online.

My second post, Forums as Connecting Points, tried to address the issues I discovered in my first one.  The main issue was that there was no way to have a conversation on an interesting topic because too many other notices and topics surfaced too fast.  As I looked around for alternative methods of communication, I remembered using forums as part of an old job I had.  The post contains a description of how people on forums can connect more easily than visitors to a blog can connect with the author.

My third post, and to me the most interesting (Chat With Grandma), was quite succinct.  My Grandma wants to follow all of her grandchildren's blogs.  I set her up with Google Reader in order to help her see blogs as they happened.  This use of social media is the first one that really struck me as productive, and I am happy to say that my Grandma is still using Google Reader and loving it.

So what was it about Grandma using Google Reader that impressed me?  It was that Grandma was using it to stay involved in the lives of her descendants regardless of where in the world they live (and there are some posts that have been written in Australia).  Because of these connections, Grandma is still able to recite the name and birthday of all of her family members for four generations.  In a more general sense, being connected is good only if those connections give you ways to interact with others OUTSIDE the internet realm.  If you can use Google Hangouts to meet face to face with people in preparation for another event, that is great.  However, if we get tirelessly entwined in Facebook and Twitter, to the exclusion of actual physical contact, we are doomed to let our ingenuity and social ability atrophy to the point of ineptitude.

These are, of course, my opinion, and I've been hesitant to post it online due to the lack of evidence that I have.  If anyone can substantiate my claim, please post a comment and I will give it my voice.  Better yet, come find me at BYU, on Tuesdays or Thursdays in the Maeser Building Auditorium at 9:30 AM and let me know in person.