Social Media and the Age of IBF
By Amy Walter
The year is 2018, Musical.ly has just become TikTok, it's cool to like Logan Paul (debatable) and you just met your new IBF. Now, if you haven’t always been a chronically online teen, number one lucky you, but number two, you may be wondering what an IBF even is. The acronym stands for ‘Internet Best Friend.’ An evolution from talking to strangers on KIK or being mutuals on Instagram, IBFs had a resurgence on TikTok, particularly in fandom culture and during Covid lockdown.
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One of my close friends during my early teens was a girl I met online, who happened to only live 10 minutes from me. Looking back, it definitely seemed safer meeting up with someone whose face you knew rather than one of anonymity. Yet, I knew it was still wrong. I told my mum I was meeting up with a mutual friend, not a girl I had never met before. But for many, these relationships remain online, a friendship built solely upon replying to a text, and if you’re lucky, a FaceTime call. But isn’t that the same as most modern friendships?
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Much like everyone else, the aftermath of Covid had left me with an increased anxiety when it came to socialising. From online school to being back to full-time education with over a 1000 students, the world of online socialisation seemed SO much easier. Rather than hanging out for hours, IBFs allow you to have all the benefits of friendships without draining your social battery. It's a pattern we see in younger children, often sitting at a park on their phones rather than playing with one another. I know what you're thinking, “Amy, you are said child!” or maybe I am sounding a little hypocritical and you’re probably right. We all succumb to sitting on our phones on the train back from work rather than having polite smalltalk with the person standing, awkwardly, close to you.
But, have online friendships really affected us that much when it comes to connecting in everyday life? And, of course, it’s a definite yes. For many, this manifests in the modern love story. Talking to someone all night online, only to not speak a word to one another when you brush past them in the school halls. Something I definitely don’t relate to… Now, perhaps that’s speaking to my own awkward tendencies, but I have a saved TikTok that suggests over 10k people feel the same way.
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In similar fashion, the scope of online relationships have also altered the dating scene. Tinder, Hinge, Bumble and other dating apps have redefined modern love as an exercise of merely swiping your finger left or right. And if you have the fortunate, or unfortunate, chance at a match, the talking stage is often short lived with an inevitable end; death by mutual ghosting.
I know this has been a pretty negative take on the online relationship, forgive me, but it isn’t all bad. For many, an additional friendship online, forged through a mutual love of a singer or TV show, can often add worthy connection and conversations. At Gut Instinct Media, one of the only ways we have writers based internationally is because of a mutual love of journalism founded, you guessed it, online.
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So, whilst a friendship separated by a bluescreen will never be the same as a meal or drinks with friends, it can often be a form of connection to those lacking it in-person. But the debate still stands whether this fosters genuine connection or encourages further isolation.
