July 30, 2005
Bloggers Are People Too
Amba, the Ambivablogger, whose sister was a classmate of mine in gradeschool and high school, asks:
So have you met blogfriends, and what was it like? Whether you've met them in the flesh or not, do you feel your blogfriendships have significantly enlarged your circle of true friendships? Come and tell. (Or tell and send the link.)I have found that electronic relationships, whatever the medium, are pretty good predictors of what the relationship will be like in real life. I once had the opportunity, back in my industrial sales days, to entertain two out of town customers with whom I had enjoyed a telephone friendship. It was one of my best nights of partying ever. Back in the days of the 300 baud BBS, I attended two get-togethers. The one for the political forum where debate was always civil but I was one of only two conservative commenters was a pleasant evening but led to no friendships. The one for users of the TRS CoCo was a waste of time; the generation gap outweighed specific geek commonality.
I read Boots and Sabers every day, for fun as well as opinion. I stopped by Owen's place of business once for a brief hello and we hit it off so well that his office manager had to chase me out after what felt like fifteen minutes but was close to an hour. I read The American Mind less regularly. It deals with local issues from a viewpoint more traditionally conservative than my own and lacks the entertainment factor. I've met Sean a couple of times, and like him, but didn't develop anywhere near the same friendship.
I haven't met M.Simon of Power and Control in real life in over twenty years. Back then I enjoyed his company and had many long conversations with him, but once in a while his eccentric fixations would get to be a bit much for me. Same thing with his blog.
Posted by triticale at July 30, 2005 10:00 AM | TrackBack