Friend... the forgotten meaning

As I was enjoying my Sunday newspaper on my couch (yes I actually still read a physical paper.. how dare me?) an article about Social Media and "friending" caught my eye. The article was questioning how many "friends" were actually "friends" and whether the 5000 cap on Facebook was meaningful. It's a thoughtful question. Apparently social psychologists put the cap at 150 due to physical limitations in the brain. The human brain is just unable to handle more than 150 friends. I thought I can relate to that, then also thought that it must sound Greek (no offense) to most Generation Xers.
What the article was mixing was the actual meaning of "friends" and the social networking meaning of "friends". In social networks it seems that we dont need to have a cap, unless it's a technology limitation as was clarified by Facebook techies. However, the "real" friend is a whole other meaning. Seems like with Facebook, and the verbalization of the word, the meaning is getting more and more blurried by the second. Friending. De-friending. hmm.
In my mind there's a very precise, real "friend-test" that I've come to learn over the years. Actual friends as it were without fail have passed the test.
What is an actual friend? Do we even know anymore? There used to be a time when friends were scarce. They were valuable. The word was reserved for the most special ones in our lives. We'd use the word to refer to our confidants, people we'd have our most sincere conversations with. They would be those who would share in our joys and sorrows. People we would laugh with, cry with, heck even cry for. In the social world, it's more like anybody we know or ever crossed paths with, in some cases anybody that those who we crossed paths with crossed paths with. We have our colleagues as our "friends" and even our bosses!
In the "old" meaning of the word we couldn't wait to share our pictures, jokes, thoughts with our friends. On Facebook, how many times do you stop and consider just who you have on your list before you post your picture on the beach dancing in your bikini and beer bottles around you? How many times did you reconsider before updating "what's on your mind" with your latest rant?
In the "old" meaning of the word, we would know many of our friends' preferences. Trivial preferences like what restaurants they would prefer (never go to Indian with Mary she gets hives), what colors they like (John always has something green) etc. So, how many people on your list know your food preference?
In the "old" meaning of the word, you would actually have conversations. You know, the verbal kind. Stay in touch. Tell me what you're up to. In the Facebook era, it's on status updates. We seem to know that our "friend" is sitting next to a drunk guy who fell asleep on the subway this morning, but failed to realize that she had accepted a new job and relocated to New York 6 months ago...
The word "friend" has become more synonymous with "acquaintance" and less so with "loved one". We have a virtual feeling of being connected, when in reality our connection is only over written word. We pass eachother online, give eachother virtual pokes, and send the occasional smiley face. With hundreds of people on my friend list I wonder how many of them I can call on to help me move? That's how big our "friend" list should actually be. ;)

Yes. One thing I've been saying is, boycotting BP is really not going to do much.
First off, the CEO is gullible enough to deny the extent of the impact the spill is going to have. But most importantly, he's just one man.
Yes, BP is the one that drilled, and yes they are the ones who were collecting the cha-ching while harming the planet. He's not the last man who's going to want to cash in on some unexplored territory.
Remember the Exxon Valdez oil spill? The problem is we havent learned anything from it. Although the spill was much different, the underlying damage and the reason why it took so long to respond was the same.
With the Exxon Valdez spill, nobody had a back-up plan. The politicians who signed the bill did not consider a plan of action for a place that is so remote in case of such a disaster.
Well, with the BP Spill, nobody had a real back-up plan either it seems. Sure there were writings on paper, and documents to show this and that. But no due dilligence. We now know that nobody had actually tested the emergency shut-off feature that everybody was so confident about. We also know that nobody tested their backup to the blowout preventer, which was covering the well in the deep-water with a subsea oil recovery system.
The article in the NYTimes: New Ways to Drill Old Methods for Clean-up about sums it all up. The questions that come to mind are why wouldn't newer prevention and safety technologies be used?
It seems from all of this that we need to be speding more time and money on prevention, safety and clean-up technologies, even if it means we need to spend less time on discovery!

It's still Spilling...

There doesnt seem to be an end in site. The oil is still gushing into the ocean...BP is now trying the Topkill Procedure. Apparently some want to be extremely optimistic to already announce that it has been successful. But not so fast! The oil has been gushing for over a month, and just because it's "maybe" slowed down, does not mean that anything was successful. Afterall, who knows the power of the oil beneath the ocean floor, who knows that it will not rupture the "topkill" solution at some point?

Hopefully there are others asking these questions and monitoring mechanisms will be put in place.

Then the questions will still remain:

What is the actual volume of the spill? What is the plan for clean up? What are the short-term consequences vs. long-term consequences that we're facing? What can we do to prevent or at least minimize them?

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) website provides lots of valuable information on the spill. Their Office of Response and Restoration page gives an up-to-date analysis to the extent of the spill.

Here are images of the spill from April 25th through to May 25th from NASA's Earth Observatory:

Note the oil slick towards the right, appearing quite contained but already extremely noticeable for a 5 day spill.

This second image is just from a week later.
Cant notice much of a change due to the changes in water current and winds:

This third image is from a week after that, so that's 3 weeks after the original spill:(May 11,2010)

This fourth image is 4 weeks (MAy 17, 2010). The spill is getting more and more noticable even from space!

And finally, the very latest:

Gulf Oil Spill - 4 Weeks On

It has effectively been over 4 weeks and the world is still watching as the earth is literally bleeding under the Gulf of Mexico.

We have brought the system to such a level that we cannot even do whatever it takes as soon as possible, skipping any bureaucracy to stop our own mess!

It's mind-boggling, heart-wrenching and absolutely sickening to see how politicians are arguing over the urgency, and getting engaged in "he said/she said" discussions instead of actually taking action. You don't have to agree on the amount of the spill, you dont have to agree who is responsible, you dont have to get the lawyers involved in courtrooms. The spill is not happening in any of these buildings, it's out in the Gulf. OUR Gulf! YOUR Gulf!

Get out and DO the work. The government, and the powers up there need to hire the most expensive scientists from MIT, Harvard, UCLA (you get the point) and fire the lawyers and the politicians in suits. We need to hire the specialists and geologists who actually understand what's going on and can actually determine how much oil is leaking, where it's going and what the actual risks are, not to mention that they can actually DO something.

They should even hire Kevin Costner, after his idea of the oil/water seperator technology.

You definitely need to fire the CEO's who actually:

"BP CEO Tony Hayward told Britain's Sky News on Tuesday morning that he didnt think the spill would seriously hurt the Gulf ecosystem. Read more..." This is a MONTH after his own failure.

Once the well is plugged and we stop the damage we're causing to mother earth, then you all can go back to your respective rooms and argue and discuss until you turn blue in the face. Meanwhile I hope you also remember to hold accountable ALL the politicians who voted for this BP Proposal without a sufficient backup plan!