Saturday 8 February 2014

Communications

I used to think I was quite modern media savvy. I enjoyed emails, texting, online chatting, skyping and skype messaging. I knew how to navigate websites, blogged, and even put content into web pages. But it has been a revelation to me to see how these things have faded in comparison to the way Facebook is used as a way of communicating by Gen Xers and below. I was recently informed that if we in the church want to reach them, inform them, get them into our loops, forget web sites and blogs and get onto Facebook instead. I guess it's not just Facebook either. My falling behind includes Twitter. I don't tweet, yet. Nor does the church, but we are going to have to I reckon. This news is, to my generation, a staggering blow to the use of English and quite threatening to those us who fear the slithey hashtag prefix. Grammar and spelling are blown out of the water, and communication is reduced to fairly instant and ephemeral sound and readbites. But we are not going to change it by complaining. If we don't get on the ship, we won't even be noticed as not being there. I will however continue to blog as it serves very well as a kind of pressure vent for me. I can have my wee bit long winded comment (forgive the Scottish paradox), and then feel better. Besides, I know my generation does not have a monopoly on long windedness. You can hear today's teenagers on the bus having fairly extended rants and outbursts of enthusing too. "Mrs Green is sooo boring. I fell asleep in her class. She just goes on and on and on..." (like you my dear). Or, "I wiz oot o ma head last night. Did ye see Dave totally oot o it tae. Whit a night. Wicked man..." and more of the same, as others join in the game of "outdo" to see who was most drunk. This is NOT a criticism of today's dissolute youth, merely a reflection on the fact that nothing much changes, because we were the same...  except that now we have the ability to be able to communicate this stuff in a medium that truly deserves it. Now, where's the dinosaur park?