Sherry Turkle,
in the first half of her book Reclaiming
conversation, talks about how media is bringing people to be
“pro-conversation,” but less sentimental. Turkle provides an insightful
observation of the current situation, which I could all relate to. I have an experience
of following the rule of two or three in the gathering of friends. Sometimes,
my close friend and I would just sit together at a café, each browsing our own social
media newsfeed, and constantly sharing funny things each found. At times, I
wonder what we would talk about if we don’t have our phones in hands. I would
be dumbfounded and would try to pull a topic from some book about communication,
such as Good skills in conversation (For
some reason, books that formulate a systematic conversation skills are popular
in Korea). The key reason behind the current phenomenon, which conversation transferred
from face-to-face human medium to digital media, is because of the digital
media’s always-connected characteristic.
In the law of supply and demand, surplus means the product or service is going to
be low value. Water was once a resource people were indifferent about. It became
valuable when people realized fresh water is not going to last forever. As
Turkle briefly mentioned in a book, people to go virtual world because it is
predictable and the users are capable of doing anything. In the virtual world,
users fight a giant monster, jump over a deep crevice, or still a helicopter. They
do these crazy things that can’t be done in the real world because the life in
a virtual world is infinite. The value of life gets cheap when it is endless. Likewise,
the value of conversation is getting cheaper because digital media allows
people to have conversation anytime, anywhere. The opportunity to communicate
with people became so abundant it is not appreciated anymore. We chat with
friends on digital media when we are with family. Then, we send text to family
members when we are with friends. The time physically spent together, which was
valued as a time to have conversation, is now less valued as well.
The
problem with abundant opportunity to communicate is that it will slowly diminish
the attitude toward conversation itself. People feel face-to-face conversation isn’t
as valuable as before. Turkle says people are at least pro-conversation on
digital media. This, however, can change within time. Product life cycle theory
suggests that a new product develops stages of introduction, growth, maturity,
and decline. People will begin to lose interest in digital conversation as time
pass. I remember the time when I first used the mobile texting system. I was
full of excitement and expectations. I also remember the first time I posted
something on my facebook wall. I was again, so excited and amazed to see my
friends commenting beneath my post and to get notifications. Getting an IM app
on a mobile devise was an interesting moment as well. The feature that let users
know if the other person read the message or not, and if they are typing their
response was mind-blowing. The features, which were once so magnificent, are
now nothing but annoyance. It stresses me that people know when I received
their message. People’s expectation of my instant response (because digital
media allows me to make instant response, and others know I have one!!) also becomes
a burden. Because I know I can always comeback to a conversation whenever I
want to, I started to procrastinate on my responses. Like the decreased value
of conversation on physical contact, the conversation on digital media was pushed
back on my priority list. One of the problems that arose in Korea was that
bosses would send work related text anytime, even during the night or on
weekends, because ubiquity allows them to. The ubiquitous conversation that
finds me any time and space, however, is annoying. Unlike the previous reading
materials that focused on benefits of always connected media, Turkle points out
negative aspect of digital media, and I agree with her. The novelty of digital
conversation will fade with time, and the diminished value of conversation in
general will only left alone.
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