Blog A Trend: Forging Our Future Friendship
I forgot where I’ve heard this being questioned : ” Who on earth still receives mails in their mailbox from friends anyways ?”
I still do ! But that’s beside the point – it’s just so amazing to see the ‘revolution’ of friendship with the help of technology. I still remember writing letters and notes to keep in touch with friends, say 10 years back. It was a regular thing to do with my overseas friends and funny enough, I still keep most of them since I’m pretty sentimental. But with the introduction of emails, IM and mIRC in those days, writing and snail mails are long forgotten.
One thing that really allowed me to make more friends was those mIRC days in secondary school. Who can possibly forget the numerous nights you spent infront of the computer at various #, ‘fighting’ to become @op/+v randomly having people asking you “a/s/l?” Surprisingly, I’ve met several friends on mIRC and we’re still friends even though mIRC is like, dinosaur era for us.
Not forgetting social networking sites like friendster and facebook ! Many ‘old friends’ are found when everyone starts using facebook and looking up for eachother via the internet. I’m happy to have found most of my friends back in primary school and of course those who are overseas, facebook really made everything more convenient for us to keep in touch.
Having friends overseas is a huge problem back then, because it takes weeks to exchange letters ! Now we can just skype or call directly from computer-to-landlines to keep in touch. I really survive on skype with my friends on exchange although my current dinosaur laptop doesn’t have a webcam *coughs* (haha). But it’s almost like we’re at the same place when we do get to ‘see’ eachother…perhaps next time it’ll be a 3D-call ! Who knows, that might just be the new trend in years to come.
Moving on, now we have Foursquare which is a mobile app to ‘follow’ your friends when they are out. I don’t know if I want to let my friends know whether I’m a few blocks away from them or ‘stalk’ me virtually. But I see the advantages for those who are around the area and wants to meet up for a short gathering. In fact, if you’re adventurous, you can probably meet new friends if they happen to be on Foursquare too ! Mobile is like the next important thing now, I definitely think we will be relying on the mobile platform to keep in touch – and not just via calls and smses.
It’s probably a good thing that we have so many various platforms to keep in touch with our friends and technology has indeed make things alot easier. However, I think having such ‘virtual relationships’ still can’t be compared to a ‘real friendship’. Worst of all, now we have robotic friends/pets that keep the next generation company. Will our future generation forget how to interact with a real human being and just maintain such virtual/digital relationships in the future ?
It’s rather sad to see couples or friends sitting at the same table with their faces plastered to their mobiles/laptops. As much as I appreciate the technology, I truly agree with this quote I’ve found off the net,
“True friendship isn’t about being there when it’s convenient; it’s about being there when it’s not.”
So spend time with your loved ones, not because it’s ‘convenient’ but because you love them and want to be with them. Technology can only help you that much, it takes your individual effort to keep in touch afterall !
Tags: 3D, blog a trend, email, facebook, foursquare, friendship, friendster, futureis, HP, hp mini, laptop, mirc, netbook, skype
Last Saturday, I had the privilege to attend this blogger event/panel organised by HP and Microsoft. The event theme was “Envision the Future” and 6 panelists shared their thoughts on the future. I enjoyed the event alot because it was an eye-opener to see how different individuals see the future as in different perspectives.