Brave New World of Digital Intimacy

I found this article to be extremely insightful and relevant to some of my own thoughts about Facebook newsfeed, Twitter etc. Indeed, there are more than one ways to look at this phenomenon. On the one hand there is a sense of reliance on those mediums instead of real, immediate communication; on the other hand, one cannot say for sure that the absence of such mediums would lead to any direct communication in the first place. Therefore, while it is true that personally, I don't care about 3/4 of the posts I see on those sites, there is this 1/4 that connects me to others, makes me feel like I have an outlet to discuss things, express opinions, promote creations through vids and links etc. Also, the term ambient awareness does capture this new, contemporary style of connection amongst people. We are close enough to feel part of a whole and removed enough so that we are not forced to share if we don't want to.