how real do we want to be online?

Yesterday I decided to make a video of myself talking about why I liked playing foursquare. I was inspired by a fellow over in the States, who had recently made a video talking about foursquare day and I thought it was cool. I am interested in making videos and thought it would be something fun to do. 

So I made one.

It was just me talking about why I liked playing foursquare and the idea behind this blog. I felt pretty good about the video and then I watched it. I stopped for a second and thought to myself how is this going to come across to people? Am I going to look stupid?

It's one thing to author a blog, I don't every really feel self conscious about what I write. Sure. people can see photos of me online if they want, but there was just something about seeing myself on video that made me wonder if I should post it or not. I decided to go ahead and post it on You Tube, but I didn't post it on here and I later took it down. 

It made me feel really vulnerable. 

In video I was talking about an article that I read online about the etiquette of adding friends on foursquare. The author of the article was saying that you should only really invite people that you are actually friends with. Now at some level I agree with that. I could add my entire address book of people, but unless I have relationships with them all I am really doing is cluttering up their inboxes and being a pest.

I will of course follow people that I've never met on Twitter, but I only friend people on Facebook that I have either met in real life or if we've had some kind of email correspondence. I don't just blind friend people, that's just annoying.

However.

I mentioned in the video that I only had about 3 friends here in London and that I've been adding people that I "knew" through Twitter or Facebook to make playing the game more interesting. 

When I watched the video and heard myself saying that I only had three friends in London I worried that it might sound really sad. I wondered if people would think that I was some kind of loser?

But, it's true.

I have 3 really good friends here in London. Mary, Ali and Becky. That's my core group. Mary was my study abroad coordinator when I was at LCC. We were never friends then, but she followed my blog and eventually we met up. Ali and Becky are friends of my husband (Matthew), but we get on like a house on fire. 

I've got a small handful of other people, so more than three. Not many of them are on foursquare, although I've tried to convince them to get on there.

I don't think it's sad at all. First of all it is the truth and secondly does having a large number of friends make me a better person? I've come over to London and had to start over, friends wise and I think I've done pretty well. 

I am building up a network of friends and that takes time. It takes time because I want good friends.

So anyway.

I just wanted to add my two bits about that. There's sometimes a struggle between wanting to be completely honest and then worrying if I am sharing too much and how it might come across to people.

I am definitely on the side of honesty. I know that posts on this blog have been useful to people. I think people want to connect with people who are willing to let their human side show. I wrote posts about when times were hard adjusting to London and what it was like looking for a new job. I didn't just write about the good things, because that's not how life is. 

I am going to continue to take risks and to just be honest. It's the best policy.

A big cheers to the people who don't know me who have accepted my friend request on foursquare! You're good people!