Sunday 19 July 2009

The Need to Know and Be Known.

It is natural for human beings to want to know the juicy details about the affairs of others. Especially, about the daily lives of the affluent and successful members of our communities.
Bizarrely, people do relish news that their neighbours , friends, colleagues and especially successful celebrities are not doing well or that they are facing some challenges or some scandal.
The more they protect their private details from public knowledge,
the more determined certain people are to dig them up.
Then , the juicier the information is when they are, finally,leaked into the public domain.
Nothing sells newspapers like a delicious "scoop" of dirt about some one's secrets!
Nowadays detailed information are freely provided on Internet sites by malicious postings or by the very people concerned, the "stars " of the stories themselves!
Free photos and details about the stars, posted by themselves on their sites is one up against the paparazzi! Takes the wind out of their sails .
Some of us give out free and generous photographs and information about the minutest details of our lives and see and read same about the lives of thousands of our contacts on social network sites .
However, official and specialty blogs and websites rarely give out unnecessary personal details and photos but they concentrate on the serious issues and business for which they were set up.
Recently , private details of the home address and family life of a top British government official were freely served on one of the popular Internet sites by no less a person than the mistress of the house!
People wondered what she was thinking ,"doing all that"?
Nothing really . She did nothing unusual .
Just did what millions of people do on web sites every minute of any day.
That is, doing the "normal" business of letting others know how well we are doing , letting the world know who we and what a wonderful home , fantastic marriage , beautiful children and dream jobs we have.
The norm on these sites is posting pictures and write-ups for all to see and know about what charmed lives we are living, our foreign holidays, our many wonderful friends and the A-list social life we have! Phenomenal!
You post it all, hour by hour and then "test the water" to see how many hundreds or thousands of people actually, would log on to read the minutest details about the colour of the ties you wore today or the socks your kids wore and what they did and said in school. Don't forget to add how you woke up ,yawned lazily in bed,got up and then went for a jog, returned 15 minutes later, had a drink ,went into the bathroom.
Came out . Cleared your throat, thought of what next to do now. Bored. Yawned again.
Went out into your very large back garden, came back in, had a cold drink and then went shopping,returned one hour later and then went for a swim.Returned and went out for a lovely dinner with the wonderful hubby and kids in the evening! Went home. Had a late drink and went to bed.
Thank you very much for visiting this site. Good night.
Oh,I forgot.Got carried away and I have written more than 50 words already.
This my narration here of a person's day is too long, isn't it ,for such sites?
Some of such "valuable" details about someone's lives attract at least ten thousand hits a day from their readers and followers who need to know, daily, about what is happening in other people's lifes.
I can hear what you're thinking and you're wrong!
Some of the thousands of followers or visitors , "hits" to these sites are sane , responsible adults ; not impressionable ,star-struck , screaming teenagers.
The husband of an American actress posted a photo of her naked back only, as she laid face-down on the bed and a second photo of her sitting on the toilet seat.
The pictures got over five hundred thousand "hits" in one day.

The main attraction to these sites is that thousands are signing up, daily and many follow the crowd because they believe it is the "in thing" to do and the best place to satisfy the human need to know and be known by others.
And why not? Being part of the on-line community is harmless fun and is beneficial to millions. It is a fantastic forum for social networking and marketing people ,ideas and products .
Especially if and when we need to present our products to a diverse audience and we want them to know us and we want to know them.
Nothing promotes a person or product like being online , being in contact, being seen and heard by thousands if not millions on the world -wide web.
Feedbacks from many lonely people,who have nobody to talk to for days or even weeks show that they derive pleasure from logging on.
It is where they can live their lives anonymously and find some human contact.
Where they can post a few lines of details about themselves and receive some comments from total strangers.
Then , they in turn can see and read about what is going on in the lives of total strangers.At least,in that way, they get a sense of belonging to the human race.

So why begrudge a wife for the naivety of posting security details of her husband on an Internet site? I guess she was a novice to the Internet and didn't know that you shouldn't give out certain information on the Internet.
Or may be she was carried away ,like people could be when they are having fun .
The problem is, when people are carried away while giving out personal information, a lot of stuff are exposed which shouldn't be.
For some, the details exposed are the truth about the state of their lives.
But for many, the time spent online is SHOW TIME!
Their fun is heightened when they lie, embellish the truth and or conceal the facts about their person ,in order to pose ; to impress and attract others .
Professional liars and fraudsters or just simple , male and female amateur liars: dreamers all ,living out their fantasies by "releasing" terrible white , pink , black or green fibs ( lies )are in abundance on these sites .
The red light on Internet sites is: Have fun. Relax . Not every one online is a pervert or fraudster. Interact with strangers. But watch it .

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