Together We Stand

For some time now I've been contemplating how social networking and collective intelligence can be and is being applied in a variety of life situations. My niece found this video and posted it on Facebook. I have also recently been listening to this book by Bill Kinnon.

Social networking occupies a measurable portion of my work and private life now. When it comes to interacting with my community of friends and family who are not in my immediate geographical area, or who I cannot see except infrequently due to time constraints and schedules, Facebook has become my preferred tool. I have been able to reestablish connections to friends and acquaintances from decades earlier in my life as well as know much more about people I am in ministry with but cannot be face to face with daily.

I have done ministry for some through social networking and had real life events begin in the crucible of the social network. I have observed how my children and their friends use social networking to communicate and add to their relationships, and how in some cases they are already either taking this powerful medium for granted or even disengaging from it because of the demands it can place on them. When disdain or rejection of a widely used technology appears one can assume it has become ubiquitous enough to be pushed back against.

What I'm observing now is that the generational divide between social media users and non-users is blurring faster and faster. My middle-ager, baby-boomer group is one of the fastest growing segments, but so is the generation just before ours. The drivers seem to be family issues and ease of communication.

While this type of networking is still called 'virtual', I am personally regarding it more and more as 'actual' - even as telephone conversations have been considered 'actual' communication instead of virtual for decades now. Texting, chatting, using video/audio communication like Skype, text communication like Twitter are all becoming considered to be 'actual' interactions and the 'virtual' label is losing its social meaning - now referring simply to the mechanism of the communication rather than imparting any judgment of the relative value of that interaction. Less and less is 'virtual' interaction being seen as less desirable, valid or useful as compared to accepted 'actual' interaction.

We are solving real problems through applying the power of collective intelligence and collaborative work connected over 'virtual' platforms (MySpace, Facebook, etc.). We are expanding, maintaining and continuing our personal networks through the same media. We are connecting and making community and these new technologies offer powerful tools for us to make positive differences for ourselves and others.

A church I heard about changed its policy making structure from a top-down executive model to a congregation engaging work group model. At one of the first meetings where they implemented this the people attending were broken up into work groups and given aspects of the issues being addressed to discuss and report on to the larger group. There was some resistance to the change, but one elderly member in her 80's simply stated, "This is the way we do things now."

And I think Scripture encourages us to use these various media to bless each other.

Social networking - this is the way we do things now (or it will be very, very soon.)

Shalom