For Sale

I had posted a week or so ago about my thoughts and fascination with the Missed Connections page on Craigslist. The way in which people interact with each other on this site, and the hopes that they have in finding complete strangers that they believed shared an intimate moment with them in passing, is simply remarkable. However, that's not the only surprising use of Craigslist being employed recently; and this newest discovery has me completely dumbfounded!

As I was browsing through Elle Magazine last week on the beach in Cuba, I was shocked to find a new type of "enterprise" starting up on Craigslist. What is this business you ask? Prepare yourselves for this one. Panty buying and selling. Used panties that is. Online interactive forums and businesses such as eBay and Craigslist actually provide an opportunity for the public to buy and sell used women's underwear. Sadly, I kid you not. These online participatory media are actually facilitating a type of underground market for used women's underwear.

In the article, the author sites such examples on Craigslist as, "I bought your panties at The Bovine, Saturday 2 a.m., and I want to buy more." and "You sold me your panties. Broken Social Scene. Let's meet up!" According to the article, women's underwear are commonly bought off the street in downtown Toronto as well as off online forums such as Craigslist and eBay.

When looking into the matter, I found several discussion forums on Yahoo Answers on how one would go about selling their used underwear on these types of sites. I also found a whole section of people looking to buy the undergarments on Craigslist, such as this one and several others that are too explicit to list.

Following my initial disgust and awe with this new business endeavor, the sheer multitude of uses for online forums, networking tools and business really began to sink in. For example, Craigslist itself can be used to buy and sell used furniture, cars, find babysitters, rent a house, find a job or... buy used women's under; and it has local sites all over the world! It never ceases to surprise me the things that people can come up with. I wonder: is this just a smart ploy for women to make some extra money? Or is it more exemplary of the reasons for which such forums as Craigslist exist? As the famous saying goes, necessity is the mother of invention. With that in mind, will such trends as the used underwear sales continue? Or perhaps elevate to the degree in which new online forums will be required to facilitate the popularity? I really can't say, only time will tell.

So I open this up to all you bloggers out there. Have you heard of this new trend? Do you agree with the use of public online media such as Craigslist and eBay facilitating the sales of used women's underwear? What does this use of technology say about our society? What are your thoughts?

Missed (Mental?) Connections

A couple days ago I was reading an issue of Elle Canada when I came across an interesting article about Craigslist. The article is about the author's personal experiences and sentiments towards the 'Missed Connections" page on Craigslist.

The author explains her admiration and dedication to this page because she says, "it pleases me when someone references a location that I know". In her article she gives an example of a post that someone might write in the "Missed Connections" page on Craiglist, "Saturday night, tall black girl, mauve skirt, buying a hot dog, Bathurst and Queen." She explains that these types of postings entice and excite her because she has a friend with a studio in downtown Toronto close to the intersection of Bathurst and Queen and therefore she feels a connection to the posting on Craigslist. She writes that although she doesn't fit any of the above characteristics, she still feels a connection to the people in the listing, that she feels included. She writes, "Bathurst and Queen, I smile to myself. Yes, indeed, this is my town."

After reading this article on personal ads on Craigslist, I feel slightly concerned for the future of human interactions. More specifically, I question the type of human relations that such internet social media as Craigslist are promoting. This article certainly intrigued me to check out the "Missed Connections" page on Craigslist, through which I have found many alarming and interesting scenarios. There are many different postings, such as people who glanced at each other on the subway, or nearly incoherent desperate pleas to old lovers, people trying to give advice on relationships, to even scandalous encounters in a gym shower.

I have heard about these types of online personal services, but I had never browsed such a sight until today. Firstly I find it fascinating that quite a number of people post their 'encounters' on this site. Reading some of these posts, it's amazing the whim that people will take on trying to find a random person that they exchanged a glance with, or thought was cute when they passed each other while grocery shopping, etc. etc. There are so many bizarre yet everyday situations that people put such hope in and post online 'ads' almost to find a lover/significant other.

I find this type of participatory media to be rather entertaining to read, and rather interesting. I wonder how successful these services actually are? How many people actually find the person they are looking for and how often do those connections work out? Do participatory media such as "Missed Connections" on Craigslist provide useful services to humanity? Is this website simply an contemporary extension of a newspaper's personal section? Or is this an abuse of partipatory media that could be used for greater things?

Being I'm new to this type of media, I may be too critical of the "Missed Connections" section. The site does provide a forum for those searching out "missed connections" in everyday life in the city of Toronto, but it appears as an abuse on good intentions. Perhaps this medium provides a sense of community amongst people, but if so, what does that say about the state of humanity?

Voting in the Sphere - Pt. 2

So almost a week ago I blogged about the upcoming WLUSU elections, and the new endeavors that the elections team was putting forth in an attempt to increase the voting turnout this year. As outlined in the post below, one of the main initiatives was hosting and broadcasting a presidential debate while streaming it live online. The broadcast of the debate was supposed to help the student body get further involved in the election process by informing them of the presidential platforms in hopes of getting a greater voting turnout out at the polls on February 4th.

Well, as of approximately 2:30 am on February 5th the results are in. According to the article in The Cord, voter turnout was approximately 2600 students, which equates to about 20% of Laurier students. This number is down a couple hundred votes from last year's elections, which suggests that the new election initiatives put forth this year, such as using social media to stream to the inaugural presidential debate, were a failure because the overall voter turnout decreased. However, despite the results, I fail to believe that further informing students using social media such as broadcasting open forums and debates on election topics at The Cord's website, could ever be a hindrance or downfall to the democratic process of voting.

Yet taking the low voter turnout at this year's elections into account, I wonder what it takes to increase student's interest in university politics and the student union elections? Is the use of social media beneficial to this process? Does the use of Facebook, Twitter, blogs and live streaming forums need to be altered or let go altogether? I suppose only time will tell.