Internet An Act of Omission

An act of omission. 

That is what the internet is.  Google’s decision to seal Google+ and send it to the archives is proof of the omission that the internet is a market place, stock exchange or like massive open markets in Ghana and Nigeria, and not a friendship or social networking platform.

Google+ is not making money: “……due to low usage and challenges involved in maintaining a successful product that meets consumers’ expectations.” Google’s statement about the shut down is not in plain English, but even people without Ph.D. degrees recognise, product and consumer. 

These words are absent in social networking sites because the act of omission is intentional.  Google and the fraternity sold the idea as friendship, a borderless pool of friends joined at the hip by common interests or no interests at all.

Critical information is omitted to achieve a certain result.  For example, we welcomed the idea of connecting with friends down the block, cousins in Tel Aviv or Belgrade, Columbia School of Journalism alumni and being known all over the world by faceless ‘friends’ and friends we can never meet. 

Google+, Face, Twitter and the rest of the fraternity appeal to the self, to the personal, to me.  We readily volunteer personal information, i.e. email addresses, hobbies, married or single, phone numbers, location and other data necessary to help the fraternity sell products, ideas and human beings.  It is not unusual for some computer to ask for access to photos in my phone.  I always click No.

Social networking websites have their backs covered.  The Accept button.  We are supposed to scroll down the terms and conditions before we click Accept but who does?  However, this does not absolve them from the intentional act of omission that lead us to the Accept button. 

We then complain when we suddenly get ads about lions as pets.  It’s because of our Google searches about the safest way of taking selfies with lions, but that’s another story.

Google+ will be missed because it was very good initially, photography sites in particular.  There was someone who taught us a lot about his Kashmir in India.  One photographer loved his Scotland and another one his Budapest, Hungary. 

However, photographers got lazy and stole pics from the internet and recycled them. One singer started a photography community which she used as her playbill.  No photos, just her videos.   Another moderator saw a photo of three generations of a Kenyan family and labelled it spam.

The act of omission about so-called social networking is one of the reasons why people bid the internet farewell.  One way to fix the problem is to admit the omission and say, ‘hey, it’s not about friendship, you give us your friends’ particulars so that we can advertise products.’

By:  Nonqaba waka Msimang.