Internet Friends

I don't know why people can't view other forum members as they do people in a town, or at a party. I like the town that I live in but there are people here who I don't much like, and others that I'm just not interested in getting to know. Being a small town, there are times when it would be uncomfortable not to have to interact even with those I don't like so much, and I have been at gatherings that have included people I don't like, but I don't feel that I have to either win them over to my side or go to war with them.

No, I just participate in a little bit of conversation if I have to, so that it doesn't look like I'm the one being an ass, knowing that not everyone else in the room is aware that we don't like one another, but I mostly talk to those who I'm most comfortable with. That's not particularly difficult, and it's not phony because bad relationships don't have to be fought out in public, or at all for that matter.

In fact, there is one person in town who dislikes me very much because I was instrumental in his losing a very good job that he had wormed his way into, siphoning off a great deal of local, state, and federal funding that could have been put to better use. He went from being the director of an up and coming organization to working at the local Subway, so it's fair to say that we weren't best of friends. Realizing that he had a hard time even being civil to me when we came across one another, I came to enjoy putting him in such a position. If I came across him in a public place, such as the grocery store, I'd make a point of saying hello to him and making small talk, doing my best to sound as friendly as possible. Unable to reciprocate in kind, he came across looking like a jerk, and I rather enjoyed that.

Okay, maybe that's not what I want to encourage, except to say that it's quite possible to be civil to people you don't like very much. When both parties can do it well, in time it's possible to forget why you don't like one another but even when that's not the case, you're not leaving everyone else feeling uncomfortable. Sometimes that's the best you can do, and if you can do it without talking bad about one another behind the other's back, that can go a long way toward smoothing things out.

If I were to find that I disliked most of the people in my town, I'd think about moving, and if I found that I disliked most of those at a party, I'd excuse myself early, but so far I haven't had to make that decision. If so, I might also spend some time trying to figure out why I dislike so many people.

As I mentioned in my other post, some people are, in real life, the same person they are online; others not at all. For that reason, I am careful about what I say to people who I don't know in real life -- or I used to be. I'm not so vulnerable anymore, so I don't keep a lot of secrets.

Many years ago, when the world was still in black and white, and Al Gore hadn't yet invented the Internet, I ran a computer BBS. For those of you who are unfamiliar with Bulletin Board Systems, they consisted of three basic parts: games, forums and chat. Even before the Internet, BBS systems allowed people to participate in discussions with people from other parts of the world who they didn't know.

In one of the forums, I was discussing politics, as I do now. But in another introductory thread, I had mentioned the name of the city that I worked for, and talked about my job there. Well, someone got so incensed over whatever it was that I was saying in the political forum, that he actually called the city manager, who I reported to at work, apparently trying to get me fired. I don't know what he said to the city manager but he passed the call on to me, telling me that a crazy person was on the line. Nothing happened as far as my job went, but it was embarrassing, and it was a shock to find that the BBS world could intrude into my real life. I felt invaded, and I learned not to put a lot personal information out there for people to misuse.

That violated an unstated rule that I had taken for granted, as I would have never considered taking an argument that began in a BBS forum outside of that venue. I still feel that way, which is why I have no interest in reading anyone's private conversations. It is also why I don't try to figure out who any of you are in real life. I know how to find things online and, as the forum administrator, I would have more information at my disposal, but I honestly haven't had any interest in figuring out who you were beyond that which you volunteer in forum discussions.

It's not that I don't have any interest in you. Many of you, particularly those who have been with the forum for a long time, are friends in a different sense than friends who I know in real life. I feel that I am friends with who you seem to be in the forum, but I don't know if that's who you really are. I suppose that's true of some people who I know in real life too. Many of you are probably who you seem to be in the forum, and I don't doubt that some of you are using your real names.

If you choose not to use your real name, I'm not going to invade your privacy by trying to figure out who you really are. That would be the online equivalent of hiring a private investigator or breaking into someone's house in order to learn more about someone I have met in real life. That's going a bit further than is reasonable, as far as I am concerned.

No, in real life I accept what someone tells me. Oh, I am not so naive as to believe that no one ever lies to me but unless I'm thinking about going into business with them or something, I'd rather take them at their word.

The same is true in a forum. Some people like to pretend, to some extent, and generally there's no harm done. Since this is a seniors forum, I am not comfortable with people pretending to be seniors when they are really much younger because that would diminish the significance of a seniors forum, and it would also be the question of why they are doing that. Some of the reasons that I can think of aren't good so when I have reason to believe that someone isn't really fifty years old or older, I will look into that and I have removed a few people from the forum who weren't fifty, but that hasn't been a common problem.

We may form friendships in a forum, but they are not really the same kind of a friendship that you have formed with those who you know in person. Certainly, I enjoy those of you who have been participating in the forum regularly. I get the feeling that some of you aren't particularly fond of me but that's okay too. If you don't enjoy me, as long as you can enjoy the forum, I'm good with that; at least for now, although I'd like to change your opinion of me in time. There should be another word for an online friendship but I don't know of one.

My wife and I met in a forum about seven years before we met one another in person. We were both working for the Open Directory Project (DMOZ) and the ODP had a private forum where we mostly discussed directory issues, to be sure that we were working toward the same end, but there was also an off-topic area where we could talk about pretty much anything. When we actually met for the first time we found that we were both who we seemed to be in the forum. We were later married, and have been together for more than sixteen years. We are both friends with a few other people who we met in the ODP forums.

Real friendships can occur on an Internet forum but, as in real life, there are also dangers involved. You can't really consider someone to be a friend until you know something about one another and, unfortunately, some friendships aren't truly genuine and others don't last, so whatever information you might have put out there can be used against you. I don't do that, but some people do. That is unfortunate.