http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/video/facebook-blues-12796540
“daily dose of distorted reality”
I do think that social media distorts reality and makes others feel bad about their own lives. We are even aware that the information flaunted on their page is not the complete story and still we’re envious and begin to believe that our lives are boring and mundane. Now that Facebook allows you to “check-in” to restaurants and other places; people are announcing to their friends, “hey look, I’m not home, I’m out and about enjoying my life.” We feed into this distortion by taking part of foursquare or by posting up pictures or statuses of what an amazing time you had.
People post these up to share their excitement or enjoyment with their friends rather than to brag. (Hopefully most people are like that). I think the reason we started to share our lives was initially to share what we’re experiencing, but somewhere it started to be about who can “out-do” the other. And that’s when people start doing crazy things and posting them on Youtube to get more viewer counts. It’s like back when Myspace was big, some people took provocative pictures to get more friend requests.
This article from the LA Times talks about how “an individual’s social success in the virtual world doesn’t appear to carry over into the real world.” Which is what the video clip above is saying as well. The younger generation using social media has grown up surrounded with social media and high usage of technology that I don’t think they’re aware that their reality is distorted.
