What might have started out innocently enough as a way to stay in touch has mutated into this sinister monster that we now know as ‘Social Networking’.

So whether it’s your next door neighbour or the third cousin of your friend’s aunt’s daughter, its an open-for-all to blast you with all the happenings in their lives, not only expecting you to give a damn, but also respond with what’s happening in your own!

Have people forgotten how to type e-mails or pick up a phone & dial? People who wouldn’t say ‘Hi’ if they ran into you in the streets suddenly become your best pals on the net!

Recent studies have shown that most people actually prefer to interact with their fellow human sitting in front of a monitor than physically talking to them.

The high degree of anonymity that a faceless chat provides nudges people to lose their inhibitions that they would normally have, sometimes with disastrous consequences, case in point being the numerous cybercrime scandals that have emerged recently.

The problem is not the concept of social networking on the net, well not entirely, but the way these sites have come to be used.

Instead of being tools to find long lost friends, they have become almost like blogs, and that too not very intelligible ones, where everything you’ve done is blurted out for everyone to read and suffer!

Wake up people, shut down your computer (ask someone if you don’t remember how, been a long time, hasn’t it?), go out for a walk with some actual people; and remember to not tell me about it!