Death on the internet
by Bob on September 7, 2007
What does it mean when someone disappears off of an online social interaction network like MySpace or Facebook, or doesn't reply in email. Someone we only know through the net. What does it mean ?
Did they simply go away to Alaska or Tahiti in eternal bliss ? Who would you call to find out ? You don't have their phone number or address or someone who knows them personally. Would you write the overseer of MySpace ? How would he know ? Is the person sick ? Did the person die ? Or did the person just "die" on the internet virtually speaking?
This is a pitfall of e-relations. Not being able to determine exact status of an e-person is a problem if we want to be humane or even human.
So when someone disappears off the internet we just figure they aren't doing MySpace or email anymore. Maybe that's way off the mark.
There was an interesting issue regarding webcams when they first came out. One was fixed on a city, let's say, in Dublin, Ireland showing the main bridge in real-time, whatever that means (because it really isn't "real" time, but let's not get into that). Suppose we see someone unknown to us fall off the bridge in Dublin and we are in New York City. What do we do ? Call 911 in New York ? No, that won't work. We can't do anything save but call the authorities in Dublin. And what would we tell them ? We saw someone fall off a bridge at 2320 in downtown Dublin ?
There's a sociological problem with the e-village. We must treat it as a theatre of the absurd, sometimes.
The trouble is that real people may be involved and we don't know what to really do.
I'm all for real villages and cities where we cohabitate physically. But those days are being overshadowed by the e-villagers. Will there be an e-doctor and e-ambulance, too ?