Forget swine flu, that's just so 2010. A new plague is sweeping the land- we are all suffering from over-connectedness due to the emergence of social media such as Facebook, Blogging and Twitter. Apparently, being cut off from such things induces feelings of anxiousness, fear, neurosis and abject terror.
(Well that's what the bloke in front of me at the bar said last night, anyway.)
Last week, in order to find out what Twitter was all about, I 'followed' several well known people on the site. Over the next 24 hours I was deluged by a storm of utterly inane trivia. (Now I know how my readers feel)
The only feeling I experienced when I managed to work out how to turn it off was one of relief. The idea that your Facebook 'life' is somehow more important than your real one is disturbing though. I wonder if there were similar worries when story books first became widely available and people started to immerse themselves in those fantasy worlds.
By the way, does anyone know when I should use italics and when do I use quotation marks?
6 comments:
Italics for emphasis and quotation marks for .. er .. quotes. Clue in the question!
Just thought you'd want to know it's a bit grey here in Worcestershire. There are lots of birds at the feeder. I'm going out later. I made myself a cup of tea.
;o)
Just had a poo. number 4 on the bristol chart
Just don't use speech marks for quotes (unless within a quote). Most of the papers and TV news channels use speech marks and every time they do I have a Lynne Truss moment.
Quote marks also for titles and sound effects.
Jasper's blog has been up and running since August 2006. But we've point-blank-refused to have anything to do with Twitter. It's lunacy - millions of inane little comments pinging all over the place.
Also - as witnessed in the media at various times - some unwise and/or drunken fool will "tweet" ill-advised, possibly offensive, words and find themselves at the centre of a storm of indignation and potential lawsuits once their thoughts are published. Mad. What can POSSIBLY be so important that it has to be instantly flung out into the public domain? And who has such a boring life that they cannot take another breath until they've found out whether Stephen Fry has been to the toilet or not yet? Aaargh!
A good book and a nice glass of something is just fine for me - and the only tweets I want in my life are those emanating from the flying creatures who visit my bird table every day.
Apologies for the rant. Twitter does that to me.
J.
A few years ago I would have suggested you ask a teacher.
Post a Comment