Snapchat Best Friends, or the New MySpace Top 8

April 08, 2015 by Cazey Williams in Cazey's Column, Humor, Life In Your 20's, Social Media

Assuming your phone automatically updates your apps, millennial friendship dynamics shifted on Monday while you were Facebooking. That is, Snapchat released a new version - one which allows users to identify their mutual besties, six degrees of separation, and who is the Judas of your best friends (who you snap all the time and they don't reciprocate).

In case you don't use Snapchat, it's an app that allows friends to send self-deleting photos and messages to one another. Snapchat used to be just in good fun (and maybe sexting) before they allowed friends to see who their friends' top Snappers were. You could click on a person's name and see the top three people who they snapped with.

No big deal, right?

Stop the Thought Crimes: Use Words, Not Emojis

February 20, 2015 by Sara Woznicki in Life In Your 20's, life lessons, Sara's Column, Social Media, Tweets and Mascara

**Originally posted on WriteHere**

George Orwell’s novel 1984 is becoming a reality, but it's not the government deeming self-expression a thought crime. We’re doing it to ourselves. For those of you who haven’t read 1984 (or for those who were supposed to read it in high school and never did), the basic premise of the book is that the government is working to control people’s thoughts through Newspeak, where they eliminate words so that people cannot rebel.

When the government takes away words, it lessens people’s ability to object to their totalitarian ways, and hinders people from being able to give a deeper context to their thoughts. Without words, people lose their ability to think on their own accord because they can't articulate anything other than what the government wishes. It’s mind control.

Stop the Season Greetings

December 15, 2014 by Cazey Williams in Cazey's Column, Life In Your 20's, life lessons, Social Media, Tweets and Mascara

All month I have been receiving texts from friends asking for my address. You think you're being so subtle. Why oh why do you need my address? At this point I don't even ask; an inevitable Christmas card is on its way.

I want to say, Stop; don't send it. The text asking for my address was enough effort. No need to pay whatever cents to send me a holiday note. But that would make me Scrooge.

I'm still trying to wrap my head around why we send cards. I actually enjoy the life update ones aka the bulleted lists of "my son is saving the refugees in Africa, my daughter is getting her MD and engaged to a senator's son, and we just rescued a puppy mill golden retriever." Admittedly we're all eye rolling at the Joneses' mass-printed "Our grass is greener" digest, but at least I'm learning something other than "Does this friend avoid saying 'Merry Christmas'? Oh, and cute stamp."