I stumbled some time ago on a post written by Ayelet Noff on her blog Blonde2.0 where she managed to translate and summarize a very interesting post written by Yarden Lewinsky, a Medical Doctor specializing in psychiatry. I personally found this piece of text really intriguing and realized I finally discovered the main topic of my blog. So, thank you Ayelet for having given me this spark of serendipity.

So why all this fuss about Web2.0?
Any new successful trend has a “raison d’être” (reason to be). Sometimes it is an evolution, other times a real revolution, but quite often just the result of a marketer’s elusive mind. 

This post is not about defining the word Web2.0 and the technicalities related to it.
What interests me is the psychological & philosophical interpretation of its success written by Yarden en Idan.

Humans are social beings with a need to interact; some more than others. Even in Hollywood movies we can find a glimmer of true social awareness. Cast Away and I am Legend are such examples. Tom Hanks found a silent friend in the volleyball Wilson, while Will Smith had a very strong affinity with his German Sheppard Abbey and the many mannequins used to recreate pretence of human interaction. Both examples show our need to interact with others. It is a necessity and for some also a proof that we are alive and have a reason to live.

Our society has been built brick by brick based on the enlightenment of some unique personalities. Philosophers have tried for many years to study human behavior and what it is being human, by the ways we interact with ourselves and with others. In this respect, Phenomenology has probably had a very strong impact during the last two centuries.

Our civilization is a work in progress which has taken shape and huge tolls with the support of wars and great inventions. Today, we can account it is still the case. The chip has introduced a true technological revolution, while wars…are sadly enough a common banality in many regions of the globe.

Nevertheless, some recent changes succeeded in introducing a difference. Democracy for instance, with the support of free speech, helped increase the pace and gave to the commoner a place in society and the possibility to evolve. The Industrial Revolution has brought a rapid expansion of syndicates and trade unions which till today represent the voice of the fellow worker (though it is receding). This frame of mind has brought a real turn in Europe after WWII, with the constitution of the EU (potentially looking like the USA in a near future).

On the other hand population has doubled the last 40 years, bringing fierce competition and the possibility to lose oneself in its midst. This has also caused its part of shame with high stress situations and plethora of suicidal tendencies and deviances. People often feel secluded with a tiny voice no one can hear.

Then came along the mobile phone and the Internet. Those two have revised our society by bringing people virtually and continuously closer to each other. But with blogs, twitters, social communities and other applications, we have been bestowed with new means to be heard.

We are indeed virtually closer to each other, but why would we communicate? Why are you wasting your time reading this post? Why am I wasting my time writing this article? Why would you ask me to connect on Facebook?

It all started with our Ego and self-consciousness. From the moment we realize we are, we develop a relationship external to our mind and body. With self-consciousness comes bodily self-awareness. The first-person point of view on the world is always defined by the situation of the perceiver’s body, which concerns not simply location and posture, but action and interaction with other people. The body provides the egocentric spatial framework for orientation towards the world and the constitutive contribution of its mobility. Though our body contributes to our interactions and its mobility, it still has physical and sensory limitations.

As Ayelet explains in her post, Web2.0 technology is not a revolution on its own accord, however it is a mean to further develop our mobility and in a sense outgrown our physical limitations. Hardware like mobile phones and computers support our need to interact with an environment that our body does not perceive in its immediacy.  Social Networks help us get in touch with people all over the world without the need to leave our seat. Blogs, aggregators and search engines help us gather a huge amount of filtered or unfiltered information wherever we are, when connected. Instead of getting out of my chair in order to grab an encyclopedia, I just type what I am looking for in my favorite search engine.

Can we claim that the actual technology is changing human behavior in a drastic way?
I think the answer would be yes & no. (as usual)
Most of us are average/normal people having experienced the same cycles. We started being born; as a baby we began opening our ego to sustain our necessary self-development. Then we went to school, maybe university and continue with work and building our own family. Kohut claims that throughout our lives we need to see others (people & objects) not as separate identities, but rather as a continuous source of self satisfaction. This has been blatantly over-exposed by our society of consumerism. Companies started introducing new needs with a mean to fulfill their own growth. Through continuous contact with advertising pushing us to believe consuming is a necessity; many developed an overgrown expression of vanity. I believe that Intersubjectivity has led a great role in this evolution. Countless people feel the need to resemble Hollywood stars or top athletes and want to wear the same clothes, drive the same car, use the same fragrance, drink the same coffee, etc.
On top of that, tabloids have transformed our youth and made them chummy enough to start believing in the golden dreams provided by marketers and advertisers. If America was in the past “the country of dreams”, today, we are living dreams made-up by others. (Wasn’t it Google who wanted to integrate AdSense in our dreams?)

Though we live much older than our ancestors, our life is fast-paced. We want it quicker and we get bored faster. We all have access to technology, clothes, housing, art, but we want to be accepted, reassured and even more stand out. To do so, some invest in expensive trinkets, others come up with an Indie look, and more recently people started their blog or joined a social club.

Ayelet is probably right; the most prominent social trend of the last twenty years is narcissism, self-potential, uniqueness and self branding. Even top companies like Microsoft use tag lines like “Your Potential, Our passion” to awaken this feeling of uniqueness.

Social networks and blogs have managed to bring us a step further. Not only that we would like to be considered as a star, the trendsetter of our community, or whatever, it also brings the tools to personally promote and manage it. We can create our own growing virtual world of friends and connections and take over the work advertisers did in the past. This is also the reason why marketers are targeting our online behaviors. Another advantage of the web is that it provides a veil between users, there is no direct physical contact. As a result, people can take risks they wouldn’t carry out when meeting in real life. In the commencement of online social networks, we saw very little real pictures and participants used to divulge limited information. Users were still insecure and opted to create an additional mask, introducing this way a form of schizophrenia. However, when the pioneers had galvanized the way to a sustainable community growth, the insecure mask was replaced by the unglamorous boast of the narcissist.

But again, this is only a temporary situation and a transition phase. It is impossible to maintain personal relations with thousands of people. All of us are constrained by Dunbar’s Number and can have a genuine friendship with about 150 people. Nor do we have the need to stay continuously in touch with so many people, with whom we don’t have real affinities.

At first there was a need to have as much friends as possible or join as many communities as potentially accessible, with as propose to get noticed and caress his Ego. But then with time, it brings more hassle than anything else and people start focusing on the important contacts. We have friends and then we have acquaintances.

The fact that Facebook and some other social networks start to see a decline shows that those structures lack substance.

Substance will bring balance to the game. We might see more and more niche players joining, while people will begin to bond again with others they relate to, the same way as it was done when we had to physically meet a person before the introduction of the Net.

Do we all little narcissists just want to claim our existence and leave a footprint on our social environment?

I believe this is part of our life cycles and like children coming out of their baby phase, our use/abuse of social media will dissipate and resolve around substance. That’s the charm of aging, like a good wine or Sean Connery.

Web2.0 doesn’t make us more or less human, it’s just a new playfield we enjoy for a while and then move on to the next level: Web3.0, social interaction between man and machine. 

Am I personally a little narcissist enjoying my (future) potential minutes of glory?
Well, I’m born Leo, so narcissism and a huge Ego are part of my personality.
Does it intrinsically mean I am constrained, or maybe do I just have a hidden agenda?

To summarize I would say that:

Social networks are a modern and humane way to cope with a socially globalizing world.
Top bloggers are today’s gatekeepers securing a sound transition
and we are preparing ourselves for the upcoming events.