CR 7: Internet Social Network

Often, original things are replaced by the new things. Human resources at workplaces were replaced by factory machines in the industrial revolution, and  2D films are replaced by 3D movies recently. Emergence of Social Network can be interpreted in the same way: the original way of human connection - or so-called human networking - is gradually replaced by internet connection. Long time ago, 'human networking' meant that people meet each other in person, and build some relationships. Otherwise, in the current society, people can easily build social relationship by just clicking one button, or simply 'adding' others as friends. 

No one can deny that internet social network has brought many advantages so far. Facebook, for example, is the most widely used network service in the internet. People can easily type their personal information, contact with other unknown people, and build social relationships. It's so convenient and easy to use Facebook that if you want to make a friend,  simply add other people as friends, write some comments on their status,  and press 'enter' key. How simple?

However, 'convenience' and 'speed' are not always good; as Catfish depicts, Facebook has some potential to have some problems. What happens if a person makes a fake account and get friends with the account? It means that the other people associate with wrong, fake, or even imaginary person. This is absurd.

Let me introduce my experience. When I was in middle school, I met a guy in the internet chatting room. I found out that he and I were both admitted to KMLA, and thus, we chatted, exchanged mail accounts, and etc: we became good friends on the internet - only on the internet.  That was all. When we faced each other in the school, we couldn't say anything, because we didn't think we know each other in the real situation.  I felt like a huge gap between the real-life social relationship and 'imaginary' social relationship. 

I think that at least, in terms of  building social relationship, internet social network cannot totally replace the original way of making friends. If people want to make some friends, what they have to do is to meet other people in person, maintain good relationships for a long time, and strengthen their relationship 'gradually', not just press keyborads.