In the pretext of turning out as someone who can 'Rule our world' --- have we "unshaped" it for us; but little realising that ... having traveled so far ... we do not know how to take the corrective steps ?
Take some data available in the most-open source - that is internet. 'Tinder' has lost about 594,000 UK users between 2023 and 2024.
** Hinge dropped by 131,000 and Bumble by 368,000. The value of shares in Match Group, the company that owns Tinder and Hinge, also dropped by 80 per cent since the highs they reached during pandemic.
Closer home I have numerous friends - who are already bored with Facebook and Whatsapp.
If Facebook was an infectious fever; Whatsapp is utter non-sense because from the other side - ---
Some is expecting your response. And if you choose to put a Smiley. There will be next question -which part of the posting - he/she liked. Blue tick is a signal someone has read your message but that 'blue tick' business can be blocked as well. Then comes some irritating phone call - "hello. kindly check the whatsapp. It's urgent but not so serious of course".
Chances are that your mood will be spoiled. It is happening the world over and in every home and with everyone and every relation.
(Various App icons .... The illustration features a large, red broken heart on a dark red background)
Once upon a time - people would have said - 'Smoking is injurious to health'. Today; we are generally clueless.
In other words, we may say contributions/influence of Internet of Social network sites are as ambiguous (enigmatic and also puzzling) as human history's uncertain future and a rather unstable past.
Unlike now ... that is December 2025 -- in the meantime - we have bid farewell to the 'quarter' of the new century ....
in circa 2012 when Tinder, a mobile dating app, launched on college campuses in America it quickly became a hit. Tinder, by letting users sift through photos of countless potential dates with a simple swipe, made it easy and fun.
In 2024 -- 'The Economist' ran a feature-story under the headline - Why people have fallen out of love with dating-apps'.
Mind you online dating had been around since Match.com, a website for lonely hearts, launched in 1995, it had long struggled to shed an image of desperation.
Has Internet/Technology/Social Media/Dating etc etc "failed" us ?
If so why ? Were we looking for 'the threshold' of Future .... through the pages of contemporary setting?
What about History ... Logic or even 'psycho' related issues ? Are we being 'ultimate idealist' ?? When it all started - it looked like a varsity on your table computer... later laptop -- something that has survived and thrived.
The 'tablet' ... no one knows .. how many around in the neighbourhood ... but some governments supplied in schools. In the process - some suppliers, babus etc etc made money indeed.
The 'revolution' started when one should share details of the 'kitchen' shows .. the breakfast table, meeting friends.
We St Anthony gang from Shillong (a Don Bosco institute) discovered each other after 35 years. ... Journalists made groups.
Ex-Please Trust India (Please Try to Improve)
Ex-U will Never Improve ... and so on and so forth.
It all meant like "utopian dream" of social media: billions of average people could throw fragments of their lives onto the internet for global share and liking.
We reported reality from the ground level.
Journalism suffered. As Mobile handsets improved -- wrist watches vanished. Camera took a beating. But to 'post', and to interact with others’ posts, was to participate in a grand project.
Intellectuals - genuine and pseudu ones pretended "meritocracy" and so on and so forth.
But according to an article in 'New Yorker' --- "..... doing so doesn’t make much sense anymore, and it’s a little hard to believe it ever did.
What do we see on social media now, more than fifteen years since its advent? A sea of influencers and creators aspiring to varying degrees of high-budget polish; headlines announcing the latest horrors of international wars; images, videos, and text generated by artificial intelligence; and unmitigated trolling".
Some politicians benefited by it. Example - Narendra Modi.
A person 'hated' so much right from the word 'go' -- could emerge stronger and more popular ignoring media. He could not have done so in the 1980s or so.
Atal Bihari Vajpayee once had confessed about his 'weakness' and said - "I like to see my in newspapers every morning. It's intoxicating".
Some politicians suffered - examples - Manmohan Singh -- he became MMS and was mocked.
His party colleague (Rahul G). ---
Jokes about -- 2 G, 3 G etc etc and Rahul G --- damaged Congress prospects during vital period of their career.
An old 'girl friend' of mine --- once posed a question -- "Is Data process in your journalism any less critical than a stock exchange?"
I doubt whether she could have asked that -- without internet power or Social Media.
In between ... the world has changed.
Science is 'good'. Certainly it can unleash the human spirit. But people are also realising --- “I think people are more suspicious of oversharing ...".
Desi Netas often throw Hindi one-liners and quite apt ones.
"Iss mein kya rakha hae (What's left in all these)" ?
Quite True -- I suppose.
The prestigious 'Financial Times' reported that time spent on social media worldwide peaked in 2022, and fell by almost 10% by the end of 2024.
The decline they highlight is most pronounced among people in their teens and 20s.
Other data suggests that since 2014, the shares of people who use such platforms to “stay in touch with friends, express themselves or meet new people” have declined by more than a quarter.
Delhi's pollution. North India's winter or even Summer of June. -- Sultry nights, steamy days.
Wife with headache. A 'nagging hubby' if you are a woman.
Moisture soaring and so is mercury. You can escape inside to air-conditioning ... maybe.
But what does this Internet, that uncle Google and the omnipresent Social Media do to you as an individual?
If you have an answer -- get back to us.
A mischievous response will be -- "Whenever you have turned a page in life ... someone has kept a copy".
ends
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