Is The Safest Place On The Internet Our Group Chats?
We’ve all been there before – the internet trap. The trap that has left us absorbed, scrolling all night, participating in Facebook messages, likes, giggles, DMs, and retweets. With everyone posting everything about their lives on the internet, where has our privacy gone? Is it safe anymore?
Pulitzer Prize winner and award-winning columnist, Dave Berry put the internet lightly as, “The most important single development in the history of human communication since the invention of call waiting.”
He’s right to a certain extent. The internet has become the primary form of communication on all fronts of our lives. It is easily accessible and it seems like everyone has it. It’s evolved from AOL instant message to public posts for all to see on a variety of mediums.
But does it take away our privacy and communication skills we’ve previously acquired here in the real world? We’ve become increasingly less personal with one another. We can easily comment on a post fearlessly and share in seconds. Privacy is no longer a “thing,” as we openly share our most intimate details with strangers and followers.
There is hope for us in terms of our privacy and communication with one another. The hope is in the one hidden gem the internet still has to offer – group chats.
The Group Chat Agenda
I am an avid user of group chats. I have a group chat amongst a few friend at work. It seems easier and more appropriate to make comments to them over a group message than in person where I feel someone may hear me (or, more sheepishly, judge me). At least in group messages I’m subject to a greater amount of emojis than the expressions I might receive in person.
I would even categorize Slack as a group chat that I feel is still left private. Slack groups allow for collaboration to occur without the added frustration of feeling like your ideas are public. Slack offers direct messaging options and, of course, the group chat option. You have to be invited to a Slack community, which automatically closes the gap for unwanted viewers. Again, another great reason why Slack communities still add a level of privacy to our communication tactics.
More common group chats apps like GroupMe are among the millennial favorite. It’s one of the only places still left where you can share an embarrassing picture amongst friends without an unwanted comment from a Facebook friend. Conversations are deliberate with
The Safest Place Left
The group chat. It’s one of the safest spots available to us. For the most part, it’s barricaded from the rest of the internet. You’re part of a group of exclusive members who you may refer to as your tribe. Your tribe consists of the closest people to you and the closet group of people who are willing to laugh off a joke that just wasn’t that funny.
Behind the brightly lit exterior of the phone screen is a group of people spread across the state, country or world, who can now come together in the privacy of their own home, behind a phone screen and in a digital age that still allows for the sanctity of privacy. It’s sacred. It’s in our pocket at every waking moment and sometimes even at our bedside to rock us to sleep.
Our comments are kept private so long as we allow them to be. As we continue to post more and interact less, we may gravitate towards a private group chat knowing its safety is its key feature.
