It's time to drop the distinction between online and offline

I read this piece by Clementine Ford and it got me thinking.


When I first started "going online" it was using a ZX Spectrum and accessing Prestel. It was a time when email was in its infancy and Bulletin Boards were all the rage. Because so few people were able to access the internet community, there was a clear distinction between what you did online and what you did IRL (In Real Life). That distinction should now be consigned to history - along with 300 baud modems!

Taking the UK as an example, 78% of adults access the internet every day. We use the internet as an integral part of our lives, both for business and for leisure. Whether we're shopping online, paying our bills or posting on social media, our "real life" is now inextricably linked to our virtual presence. There is no longer a clear line where one starts and the other finishes.

The sometimes caustic culture of the early digital communities is being rapidly diluted as more and more people discover the advantages of being connected online as well as offline. We are online both at work and at home. Our digital presence is an integral part of our lives. It's not about spending an hour on a Bulletin Board via dial up any more.

What happens online is no longer separate from our "real world" lives - it's intertwined to the point where the difference has all but disappeared. Convergence has already happened for most of us. Shrugging off bad behaviour online as "just the internet" is no longer acceptable. Sites such as Twitter, Facebook (and other social platforms) need to up their game when it comes to addressing anti-social behaviour.

Equally, we need to consider our own behaviour now that our digital selves are far more visible, What was acceptable, even expected, amongst some regular posters in the early days is no longer appropriate.

The internet has evolved. Our online behaviour needs to evolve too.

Spontaneous reputation combustion

It's been said in many Social Media blogs - including this one - that even the most solidly built and carefully crafted virtual presence can be demolished by an ill advised blog or tweet.

I witnessed one such spontaneous combustion a few days ago. One of my followers (don't bother looking they're not there now!) uses Twitter, predominantly, for social interaction. Like a lot of people they have links to their business on their profile and mention it occasionally in their feed.

On the day in question this person engaged in a rather contentious, but short, exchange with another Twitter user. This is not, in itself, likely to cause mass umbrage. Twitter is a great place to engage in constructive debate - if you remember two things:

1. Your tweets are not exclusive to the person you are in debate with (unless you use the Direct Message function)

2. Other people can - and will - join in

By the time the individual had been retweeted, and had topical hashtags added to their comments, they were in way over their heads. They had been caught up in a Twitter tidal wave.

Their followers started to drop away. People they had been talking to for months blocked them. There was talk of not using their business as a supplier from local tweeps. Days later, they are still getting tweets from disgruntled people.

So, how many tweets does it take to damage your business? In this case 6.

Be careful out there...