Friday 23 September 2016
On the issue of seeking advice online
Hi guys, I did a short piece for the Singapore Daily about people who seek advice online on the issue of education - I do get quite a lot of traffic coming through from the forums like HWZ and I can only shake my head when I look at the quality of the interaction there. People are so brief, they barely ever follow through with an idea and if you're using it for catching up on celebrity gossip, then fair enough but there are those who actually use such forums to seek advice on serious issues like their education and career choices. A lot of what I say there is common sense, but given the nature of some of these conversations I see on those forum sense, a healthy dose of common sense wouldn't go amiss. I know there's no point in me trying to tell people to stop using those forums given how popular they are in Singapore, so here's a short list of things to bear in mind when interacting online there. Many thanks for reading.
I'm surprised some of the younger readers who have never met you even ask for such personal advice from you online! Like i have met up with you before and know you are who you are but for others whom haven't met you before how can they trust what they read online? You could be a 2-bit hack posing as a successful ex-Singaporean citizen for all they know.
ReplyDelete"Trust but verify" -Ronald Reagan
I think there's a huge difference between approaching someone like me and an anonymous person on those forums. Firstly, I am totally public with my identity and my readers know my full name, they can look me up on Youtube, Twitter, Google Plus, Facebook, Linkedin and a whole range of other sources. That's a huge difference compared to chatting to someone who hides behind a persona like "Sunlightk01" - am I talking to a 14 year old student or a 41 year old housewife? I don't know - and that's the problem with those forums. At least with the bigger names amongst the Singaporean social influencers, you know exactly whom these people are because they have such big egos and they put their faces on everything - that leads to an element of accountability because if they make a mistake by giving poor/misleading advice, then people know whom to hold accountable for that mistake. Likewise, in being so very public about whom I am (that's a price I have to pay for my big ego), I am putting myself up to be accountable to you. I am anything but anonymous on social media - in fact, you could claim that I am quite the opposite, anyone with a Youtube channel and makes his own videos is probably desperate for attention.
DeleteSo really, there's quite a huge difference between something like Facebook where people are generally quite open about their identity and those forums where people are totally anonymous. Choaniki - you've worked in IT and I would have seriously expected you to have understood this aspect of social media.
I honestly don't think that anyone would be bo-liao enough to create a fantasy persona about being a successful rich ex-Singaporean who travels the world and has all these adventures - any one who knows anything about creative writing will be able to tell the difference between someone who is making shit up and someone who is genuinely telling a true story. I have had over 8 million readers because my stories are 100% true and you just can't make up shit like that whilst putting your face there. And seriously, have you seen my big, bald, ugly face? If I were to make up a persona, I would at least use the photos of a man with a full head of head.
In any case, I find myself dealing with young people who are so desperate they have no where else to turn to. I'm currently talking to this 18 year old who is dealing with a massive family crisis after her brother ran away from home and her parents have totally fallen apart because of that (they are blaming themselves for their actions which led to what happened) and as the next oldest child, she is left caring for her other siblings - she has no where else to turn to but me; because she has read my blog and realized that I am not anonymous unlike so many people on the internet and that actually, I am probably a pretty nice person you can trust if you get past the sarcasm and the bad language.
I think you are underestimating the boliao-ness of some people on the internet. Yes, there are people on instagram and even youtube who show their faces yet are not who they say they are (don't want to name names in case i get in trouble).
DeleteOr a better example is Yang Yin who made up a totally fake persona even when people know him in real life. He even managed to fool a PAP MP into writing a letter of recommendation for his Singaporean PR.
So this is just a caveat for people being too trusting, especially if that someone claims they are an online internet celebrity (again no names, don't want to get sued).
I think there is a very hollow victory in getting someone interested in you on the basis of a lie. Let me give you a real story: this guy boasted that he chatted this pretty girl up in a bar by claiming that he is the director of a big bank and we all know that is a lie - he works in admin (in a bank, yes) but he is very low in the food chain and he exaggerated his position (well he lied) to try to impress this guy and it worked. But I said, "well, what are you intending to do when she finds out the truth?" And he replied, "oh she can NOT find out the truth." At which point I thought, that's it - you've just sabotaged your own relationship with this nice lady by starting off on a lie like that. I guess it was because he was afraid this woman would not want to talk to him if he confessed that he was a clerk who did admin work in a bank. But good grief, the kind of joy you get out of tricking someone like that is so hollow because the liar can fool everyone but they can never fool themselves. You can lie to the whole world but you can never lie to yourself as you will always know the truth - so what is the point of lying like that then?
DeleteYes I take your point that there are liars out there - I just think it is really sad that they have to resort to this instead of getting a real thrill from being genuine proud of what they have achieved in their lives.