TheBanyanTree: My Space

[Margaret R. Kramer]

Most of us older folks have heard about My Space on the news.  It’s that
evil place on the internet where sexual predators lurk and naughty children
post mean and untrue things about their teachers or friends.  I decided to
check the place out after receiving an invitation through My Space to one of
my son’s hip-hop/rap/urban music shows.

I’ve been on the internet since 1995, about the time when the internet
really exploded in popularity.  Remember when AOL and other ISPs charged
hourly rates?  Remember when most people had to use dial-up to connect?
Remember when you had to wait forever to get online if you had AOL and it
was a weeknight and everyone else was trying to get online, too?

My early beginnings with internet networking began with a mailing list
called WRITERS.  It’s a fairly open list which allows writers to share and
critique poetry, fiction, non-fiction, or essays.  We can share personal
stuff, too.  It’s not as busy as it was when I first joined.  Boy, there
were days when my email box was full of WRITERS stuff, but now it’s pretty
quiet.  And there were some serious flame wars that went on for days.
WRITERS has cooled off over the years, but every once in a while there is a
disagreement or two.

I also joined The Banyan Tree (formerly The Spoon), which is another email
list.  It’s for people to share stories and jottings from their daily lives.
It’s a mellow, low-key group, in fact, I can’t remember any type of flame
war from this list.  I’ve seen people come and go on both lists.  Some of
the members have passed away and I miss them.

Open Diary caught my attention and my first entry is on 9/29/2000.  It was
before 9/11 and hurricanes and George Bush.  Again, the connection between
people is through writing.  We can post our writings and then add notes to
other members’ entries.  Through writing and comments, a person can
gradually build up a network of friends.

Open Diary once had a Quit Smoking site, which was separate from Open Diary.
I used that Quit Smoking site heavily when I quit smoking five years ago.
That was a life saver, because every day I could read the struggles of
people as they tried to remain smoke-free and post my own.  We would help
each other stay off the cancer sticks.  I don’t think I would have been
successful in remaining smoke-free if that diary hadn’t been available.

I have a blog on blogger.com and now I’m posting my jottings on My Space.
My son said My Space was originally set up for music networking, but
expanded to include any type of networking.  There are groups of other
artists on this site, visual artists, writers, and musicians, etc.  But now
it seems to be a major site for basic networking.  You don’t need to write
anything to connect with people.  You only need to set up a spot and let
everyone know about it.  You can email others through My Space, post
bulletins to all your “friends” about what you’re doing, and send out
invitations to events and parties, and post podcasts, music samples, and
lots of other stuff.  You can search for “friends” on lots of different
criteria.  It’s an amazing place, mostly populated with younger people, but
us older people are making our way there, too.  I found out that My Space is
not an Evil Place.

To be honest, I’m more comfortable with internet networking that requires
the participants to write back and forth rather than just post pictures and
IM.  There’s something about writing that can help people connect on a
deeper level if done over a period of time.  I always need time to evaluate
if someone is writing the truth or not, or if they’re representing
themselves as they are rather than developing an alternate identity.  I do
the same evaluation when I meet people in person, too.

The internet and the way we use the internet has come a long way within the
past 10 years.  It’s become a major part of our lives, almost as important
as TV, but much more interactive.  We can use the internet to network and
make friends and share information, no matter what forum we choose.

Margaret R. Kramer
margaretkramer at comcast.net

If a June night could talk, it would probably boast it invented romance.
~Bern Williams