Virtual Proximity

When I was in college, a lot of my friends initially were people that lived in the same Freshman dorm as me. We saw each other all the time; we studied in the same lounge, shared the same bathrooms, threw illegal "around the world" parties and looked out for each other when the RA was coming. These people became my friends, through shared experience and most elementary, through proximity. Proximity is an interesting phenomena. We see this today through-out neighborhoods, apartment communities and through frequenting of the same watering holes. Repetitive behavior and frequent interaction ultimately develops into the foundation of shared experiences and more times than not, friendship. Proximity relationships still happen today, although with our busy lifestyles and our frequent comings and goings, at a lesser rate. I see the same people in my loft community every day, but we are so busy moving through life that I am no more than a 'Hello' to them and vice versa. Traditional proximity relationship building has evolved beyond the neighborhood to the arena of cyberspace. No longer do you have to be in physical proximity to a potentially new relationship, you merely have to run across them in a ‘virtual neighborhood’ on the web. I find this fascinating. Virtual Proximity. Technology has enabled like-minded socialization and taken proximity relationships to the next level. We blog, we e-mail, we share common interests, we socialize in sub-groups, we visit the same websites and we live no where near each other. The basic element that formulated the basis of relationships for centuries has evolved. Technology not only effects the way we do business and the methods for our communication, it also changes the simple methods of psychological interaction, so primary to our underlying need for socialization and acceptance. The overall effects of taking proximity out of the neighborhoods and moving it to a world-wide stage has yet to be determined. I'm sure that there will still be the neighborhood associations, block-parties and "around the world” parties in college dorms for years to come. However, the more people are satisfying their fundamental needs for relationships in cyber space, the more we will just say “Hello” to our neighbors and carry on with our lives behind closed doors.