Main Street: Connections

I have 178 connections on LinkedIn. I have no idea if that’s a lot or a little, since I didn’t initiate any of them and I never use it. LinkedIn is an online social networking site, where professionals go to, well … network, I guess. A fellow writer talked me into signing up a couple of years ago, telling me it would be good for business. I filled in a few innocuous facts about myself and immediately began to get requests from other LinkedIn people who wanted to “connect” with me.
I felt that it would be impolite to refuse these requests, so I always clicked “accept” when someone wanted to connect. After a few weeks, the emails began to pile up. I got an email every time one of my connections made a comment, updated their profile or added a photo. Immediately deleting the emails helped, but then my connections began to make demands. They wanted me to join their groups, visit their profiles and recommend them for jobs.
I found peace by changing my profile settings so that I don’t get emails anymore, except those asking for a connection, which I still, afraid to offend, accept. Those who want a rich and rewarding networking experience with me soon learn that I don’t respond otherwise. It’s my passive-aggressive way of staying in touch while being out of touch.
The same thing happened with Facebook, the behemoth social networking world. I signed up with Facebook to keep track of my favorite nephew, who was 15 at the time and sharing too many details about his life online.
I accepted all Facebook “friend” requests at first, even from people I didn’t know or really care about. I’m not very social, after all, and can’t imagine posting some comment about what I just ate, where I am or who I’m with. The Facebook requests kept coming and my “friends” now number 485, a paltry amount compared to the folks who spend hours a day trolling Facebook for news of their network and the world.
Facebook can be sort of fun when I can’t think of anything else to do. When I’ve rearranged my sock drawer, cleaned the grout in the bathroom, or hosed off the driveway … when I’m too tired or uninspired to work … Facebook can be oddly entertaining. I now know which of my “friends” are Republicans and which are Democrats, who is caught up in the harvest and who is traveling, and even who is getting engaged or undergoing medical treatments.
Twitter is really the perfect online diversion. I signed up for Twitter two years ago because it was a great way to keep up on election gossip. The 140-character limit forces the long-winded and self-important to get to the point, and best of all, I can lurk at will. I’m “following” 115 Twitterers, who range from real people to parody accounts like the guy who tweets as “God” and threatens “Don’t make me come down there” once in a while.
When you sign up for Twitter, you can make up a fake personality, but I used my real name, so 59 people who know me “follow” me, but so far I’ve been a disappointment to them. I’ve never “tweeted” and after this long, probably shouldn’t. It would just be a mundane disappointment.
There’s some sort of metaphor at play here. Every other week I write about myself, my community, my hopes and fears here in the community newspaper, but I’m timid about spilling and sharing online. I guess I am old-fashioned, despite my iPhone, iPad and multiple networks. Newspapers are real, after all.
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Speaking of the online world, Healdsburg Greyhound Evan Doll continues to shape its future. The cofounder of Flipbook, a wildly popular iPad app that allows you to create a customized magazine of all the stuff you care about online, was recently profiled on Fox Business News. Flipboard now has 20 million subscribers.
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Like most Healdsburgers, I’m voting for President Obama this fall. He has disappointed me in a variety of ways, but I still think he’s the best choice. One of my primary reasons is selfish. As a diabetic asthmatic with ruptured disks in my back and neck, I was rejected for health insurance for having too many pre-existing conditions. It was only because of Obamacare and former Governor Schwarzenegger’s leadership in getting California to adopt certain provisions of it early that forced Kaiser to take me anyway.
I also appreciate the President’s evolving position on gay rights. It was a year ago that he signed a bill eliminating the ridiculous “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” rules that unfairly punished gay men and women in the military. Zoe Dunning, a former Navy Commander who was prosecuted under DADT, was standing proudly by the President when he signed the bill repealing it. Dunning will be in town this week. Healdsburgers Tony Crabb and Barbara Grasseschi are behind an Obama fundraiser to be held tonight (Thursday) at the Wells Fargo Center and Zoe Dunning is one of the speakers. If you want to attend the event, it starts at 6 o’clock.
Ray Holley always asks, and usually tells. He can be reached at ra*******@gm***.com.