Steven has just signed in

The world has changed a lot in the last 20 years but one thing has remained constant and that is our desire to connect. In a recent post I wrote about the nostalgia for social media that actually served its purpose in creating social connections. I have thought about this a lot, the question of a world without social media and I've realised the emphasis on connections we form online today is very much public in nature. Whether you define that boundary as encompassing the world in its entirety of a limited subset of people from within it, the focus remains the same, to engage in a way that others can see.

In reflection I have come to realise that the death of platforms like MSN marked the point where this shift first occurred. In the days of MSN the emphasis was on one-to-one connections. You created an account and could add as many people as you liked but your conversations were one-to-one and private. Group conversations could be created but these were session based, ending when you closed the application requiring you to recreate them if you wanted to continue a conversation in a group. Despite the fact that apps like WhatsApp and Signal exist to fill the gap formed by the absence of the likes of MSN there is a fundamental difference between the two - you had to sign in to MSN. If you didn't sign in then you couldn't be reached, you weren't constantly connected available on demand.

Granted in later years MSN added mobile support to forward messages as texts, this required the user to opt-in, it was not enabled by default. Moreover, your MSN profile was attached to an email address, meaning you still weren't contactable by other means if you were offline, as opposed to apps like WhatsApp which use your phone number enabling people to call you if you don't respond. The boundary was much more clearly defined by MSN, you were even able to set your status when you signed in to Available, Idle, Busy, or Appear Offline in the latter case they wouldn't know you signed in at all.

I've really been fixated lately on just how toxic the idea is of being constantly connected. Digital exhaustion is very much a real thing it seems as the more people I raise this concept with the more I am told how much they hate it, yet we allowed it to become our reality, why?

I remember having a crush on a guy, and the rush I would feel every time I would see that little notification that they had signed in. I remember the long conversations we spent getting to know each other, the links we shared, the connection that we created. I've never felt that from a WhatsApp conversation, I've never felt it to the same extent with any online interaction. There's a limit to how open you are willing to be on a wall or a timeline where others can see. Direct Messages have their limitations too, with the need for a profile tied to their use and the expectation that you fill that profile and maintain it. A twitter account with zero tweets won't gain much traction.

A friend of mine recently decided to delete his Facebook profile and create a new one from scratch in an effort to start over. The first thing he noticed was how difficult it is to establish a new online presence - if you don't have existing connections you're ignored. The beauty of platforms like MSN was their privacy, you couldn't see who was on another person's contact list, that wasn't part of the design of the platform. You connected with people you knew by sharing your handle, and added it to profiles on other sites and forums etc, in other words you connected with people you had already invited or made the choice to connect with.

I recognise the utility of sites that allow you to connect with complete strangers, but there seems to be the distinct lack of a middle-ground where you can connect with people at arm's length. MSN allowed you to chat on a one-to-one basis but the platform didn't invade your private life. Someone who added you didn't have your real name unless you told them it, didn't have your phone number unless you chose to share it, knew nothing about your personal life unless you chose to share it - the common thread, choice.

The few apps that do exist to provide anonymous communication today have reputations that aren't exactly glowing. Their use is also limited to a certain type of user they aren't as widespread as their mainstream equivalents.