[jka]

This is a little difficult to explain, but as someone who (extremely ashamedly, in hindsight) became very obsessive about romantic interests - to the level of stalking behavior - at least twice over the course of my life - this is precisely the kind of technology design decision that has negative externalities which maybe aren't apparent to people who are of sound and balanced mind.

If someone is obsessed about another person, they're going to get the same kind of dopamine rush simply from seeing that the other person is online and active that most of us get from receiving new messages in our inbox or messaging apps. It's tricky to explain, but as you draw closer (or feel like you draw closer) to someone, the urge to be connected and know that they're present becomes overpowering. Moreso if that person is in any way encouraging this kind of dependence / attachment.

It's particularly bad when apps allow this kind of 'presence monitoring' without trying to deal with the obsessive behavior that it causes. Facebook, for example, clearly has the data and the ability to inform both parties of what is happening. Ironically in my case it suggested one of these people as a 'Close Friend'. It seems so much worse if the service provider is (at any level) encouraging these malign use cases - for the purposes of 'engagement', for example.

Fortunately I believe I now have the distance and levelheadedness to see how this all works (in terms of my own psychology, the relationships involved, and also the service providers who intermediated the communications), but it's something I wouldn't wish anyone else to suffer, and we could be a lot more careful about the way we design apps and services to avoid these kind of psychologically damaging situations.

The talk entitled 'What is Good Technology' from the 35c3 congress makes some very good points along these lines, in terms of what we can do improve our technology product decision-making process to avoid causing pain and damage to cultures or people we might not otherwise understand: http://streaming.media.ccc.de/35c3/relive/9965

[exolymph]

Congrats for becoming a more ethical person! It sounds like you're in a better place in terms of your relationships and I can't imagine that it's been easy. Keep on truckin'

[jka]

Thank you very much, that means a lot to me; and yep, it's been tough, but the future's looking brighter.