Keeping Tabs on Friends in the #Online World

I wanted to write a short post about the world of online friendships because many of us spend so much time here and have made connections through blogs and social media with others.

In our real world, we keep up with current events and life situations with friends and family, either in person or by phone. But in our virtual world, we chat with friends through social media, blogs or messenger apps. Because we’ve made connections with so many who live in different parts of the world, we don’t always get a chance to catch up with everyone on a daily or even a weekly basis sometimes. But one thing that I do keep mental note of is taking notice of when someone I’m used to seeing around the cybersphere suddenly disappears off the virtual radar.

I begin to wonder if that person is okay and do my usual FBI scouting around the socialsphere, hoping to find a post or a comment from them somewhere, showing that they are indeed still around but perhaps a little busy dealing with things in their real world.Through doing these searches, I have sometimes found that someone was ill, or depressed and needed a dose of inspiration, and in one instance I discovered a fellow blogger had passed away.

It really doesn’t take much to leave a missing friend a message of concern on their Facebook, or drop them a line in an email if we suspect something isn’t right.

I guess what I’m saying here is, we are community here. I’m reminding everyone if you notice you haven’t seen one your friends or blogging pals circuiting social media or blogland, do what you would do in real life, do a little digging to make sure a pal is okay. You never know when someone disappears, not seeing their comments, posts or avatars around, if they’re just taking a break or if something more serious has happened.