Ambient Intimacy

Posted on by Leisa Reichelt

LastFM IRC

I find myself talking about Twitter quite a lot. I’m not the only one. The behaviours that Twitter has made more visible are tremendously interesting.

I’ve been using a term to describe my experience of Twitter (and also Flickr and reading blog posts and Upcoming). I call it Ambient Intimacy.

Ambient intimacy is about being able to keep in touch with people with a level of regularity and intimacy that you wouldn’t usually have access to, because time and space conspire to make it impossible. Flickr lets me see what friends are eating for lunch, how they’ve redecorated their bedroom, their latest haircut. Twitter tells me when they’re hungry, what technology is currently frustrating them, who they’re having drinks with tonight.

Who cares? Who wants this level of detail? Isn’t this all just annoying noise? There are certainly many people who think this, but they tend to be not so noisy themselves. It seems to me that there are lots of people for who being social is very much a ‘real life’ activity and technology is about getting stuff done.

There are a lot of us, though, who find great value in this ongoing noise. It helps us get to know people who would otherwise be just acquaintances. It makes us feel closer to people we care for but in whose lives we’re not able to participate as closely as we’d like.

Knowing these details creates intimacy. (It also saves a lot of time when you finally do get to catchup with these people in real life!) It’s not so much about meaning, it’s just about being in touch.

As Ian Curry at Frog Design writes:

It’s basically blogging reduced to what the Russian linguist Mikhail Bakhtin called ‘the phatic function.’ Like saying “what’s up” as you pass someone in the hall when you have no intention of finding out what is actually up, the phatic function is communication simply to indicate that communication can occur. It made me think of the light, low-content text message circles Mizuko Ito described existing among Japanese teens – it’s not so important what gets said as that it’s nice to stay in contact with people. These light exchanges typify the kind of communication that arises among people who are saturated with other forms of communication.

I came across this research when I was doing my Masters a few years back and it’s continued to fascinate me (and yes, I’ve been thinking about it quite a bit whilst considering, and defending, Twitter).

Here’s an observation from some Japanese ethnographic research into the use of camera phones by young people undertaken by Daisuke Okabe (2004):

intimate sharing / presence sharing intimate photos on the handset when talking face to face with people. Photos that fall into this category would be photos of partners, family, pets, etc. However, this can also be very every day stuff eg. what I’m having for dinner. It is sharing ongoing mundane visual information with intimates, creating a sense of presence in other peoples lives without needing to talk or be physically present.

I think that the simplicity of Twitter is key to it’s success. The messages must be short and they’re simple text.  I’m starting to think that the level of stimulation is key to the success of these ‘osmotic’ communications (as the guys from LastFM referred to the IRC channel they use internally).

We’ve been trialling some options for a similar kind of osmotic backchannel to use at Flow. One of the first things we roadtested was Skype Public Chat. Amongst some other problems (including that there is no Mac version of the current release which supports the Public Chat function), it seemed that the flashing and noises and animated emoticons were too stimulating… the conversation wanted to leap to the front of the screen continually demanded attention.

IRC on the other hand (ah, what a flash back to open up mIRC again after all these years!) reminds me a lot more of Twitter. There’s none of the flashing and animating and carrying on. The humour is in the text (it took about 30 seconds for the first trout related comment to emerge… old habits…). To me, IRC seems to be a much more effective tool for a back channel, for supporting this osmotic communication within a company. (Assuming we can reduce the barrier to ‘log on’… it’s not a friendly experience for not-geeks).

What does seems clear is that, for a lot of people, this ambient intimacy adds value to people’s lives and their relationships with others. I think we can expect to see a lot more of it… but if I was building a tool to support it, I’d be keeping it very simple and unobtrusive. Osmosis is one thing, hyper-stimulation is quite another!

Twitter Me

Image credit: Slide used by LastFM in their presentation at FOWA

Reference: Okabe, Daisuke 2004, Emergent Social Practices, Situations and Relations through everyday camera phone use, presented at Mobile Communication and Social Change, the 2004 International Conference on Mobile Communication in Seoul, Korea, October 18-19 2004

157 thoughts on “Ambient Intimacy”

  1. […] Ambient Intimacy – disambiguity “Ambient intimacy is about being able to keep in touch with people with a level of regularity and intimacy that you wouldn’t usually have access to, because time and space conspire to make it impossible.” [via Strange Attractor] (tags: internet socialmedia socialnetworking blogging twitter psychology community language neologisms) […]

  2. It’s not intimacy though. Intimacy can never be broadcast by its nature. Intimacy is about more than the knowing of details. It requires two way, privileged communication.

    It may be that things like twitter encourage intimacy because it’s easier to enter into intimate exchanges with those you keep up with, but we shouldn’t mistake the two.

  3. hey kyb,

    I can kind of see where you’re coming from here but I see things a little differently. For me, Twitter – for example – is not really ‘broadcast’ – even though my Tweets are public, I don’t think of them as going out to a vast and faceless audience, rather I think of the collection of individuals with whom I regularly share communications using this medium and am communicating to them, usually as a group, occasionally as individuals.

    Secondly, I think of ambient intimacy as just one type of intimacy. It’s certainly not a substitute for all the other types of more direct and in-person intimacy (at least, it is not for me and I would hope not for anyone else). I do know that certainly my experience and the experience of many others that I’ve spoken to is that tools like Twitter and Flickr and Facebook and many others *do* create a experience of intimacy where, without these tools, there would almost certainly be none.

    It doesn’t seem to be a universal experience, but certainly significant enough to be acknowledged.

  4. leisa:

    Thanks for the reply. As I understand intimacy, it’s very nature requires priviledged communication. If you talk about ‘intimate surroundings’ you’re talking about surroundings that encourage priviledged communication. If you say ‘getting intimate’, you mean that the people you’re talking about are priviledging each other in their communication. An ‘intimate group’ is a small group of people with a special bond. It’s this specialness that is important in the concept of intimacy.

    Another important part of intimacy is not just that priviledged information is received, but that the reaction to its reception is part of the experience of intimacy. You can’t have an intimate conversation with someone who is watching the tv at the same time. A single email cannot convey intimacy although an email exchange can. Intimacy is two way, and most naturally (although not exclusively) synchronous.

    Any broadcast that can be received by others (no matter who it’s intended audience) is by my definition not intimate. If someone who doesn’t know you at all can take part in the priviledged communication channel, then it’s not priviledged anymore, and therefore the transmission and reception of the information means less. I think that the extent to which it feels intimate is actually an illusion of false intimacy, and in some cases may even be harmful to the relationship.

    I don’t want to suggest that there is therefore no value in things like twitter, im and all the other paraphenalia of social networking. It can obviously have enormous benefit, but it is almost direct opposition to the way I understand intimacy.

  6. […] This is a nice slide show on Ambient Intimacy. Ambient intimacy is … …about being able to keep in touch with people with a level of regularity and intimacy that you wouldn’t usually have access to, because time and space conspire to make it impossible. Flickr lets me see what friends are eating for lunch, how they’ve redecorated their bedroom, their latest haircut. Twitter tells me when they’re hungry, what technology is currently frustrating them, who they’re having drinks with tonight. […]

  8. […] Exhaust data This is an interesting and thought-provoking piece on the nature of the communication that flows between people using so-called ‘micro-blogging’ tools. Interesting because of the number of times I’ve heard people criticise the kind of “banal, pointless chatter” that goes on through channels like Twitter or Facebook. Am I really interested in the minutiae of my friends and colleagues’ lives?  Well, yes. I might not really be that bothered what Mr Snowbadger is having for Sunday lunch, but I do think that Leisa Reichelt’s ‘ambient intimacy‘ post holds water. It’s a kind of connection that’s quite reassuring and human – this kind of throwaway communication acts as a nice counterpart to big, heavy, thought-through content that typifies the kinds of blogs I tend to read ;).I have a lot of friends that live in far away places, and I really do find that I feel much more connected to them and their lives. When I was growing up, my family lived in Singapore whilst I was at school in the UK. I remember clearly the ONE phonecall I could make every 3 months. Muchly disconnected. Things are very different these days… […]

  10. […] I think what Anne’s driving at, though, is that some of this social interaction, some of this “ambient intimacy,” is good for us — even if it does get in the way of our actual work. I would compare it to working at home versus working at my office: at home, I can actually get a lot more accomplished, but I miss the social interaction, the miscellaneous chatting and random conversations with co-workers. Some of it is just socializing, but some of it has value — although it may not be immediately obvious. […]

  13. […] Leisa Reichelt coined the phrase “ambient intimacy” to describe it. Anyway, we’re getting away from my point (and I’m sure someone else will cover that in a post in the future)… which is that, thanks to almost everything having an RSS feed nowadays, you can very easily do a bit of mild mashup-ing and do some very cool stuff really really easily… Like pull your blog into your Twitter. […]

  15. […] Apart from its use as a info resource and publicity tool, Twitter is also a communication platform for individuals and their personal social networks. Leisa Reichelt calls this form of usage, ambient intimacy: Ambient intimacy is about being able to keep in touch with people with a level of regularity and intimacy that you wouldn’t usually have access to, because time and space conspire to make it impossible. […]

  17. […] 17 Ways You Can Use Twitter: A Guide for Beginners, Marketers and Business Owners – The longest list yet! And some original uses listed – as a tool for time management, as a repository for taking notes, and as a to do list. Also good points of the way that Twitter feels when you’re using it… how it creates “ambient intimacy,” how the user experience is fragmented, how it can be a distraction (yup, been there done that). […]

  20. […] Firstly, there’s a slew of PC clients you can run: twhirl, twitteriffic, Tweetr, etc. Tweetr was the one I used to use a lot. It’s great because it just pops up a background window of people’s tweet’s as they come in. Which is a sterling example of Ambient Intimacy. Effortlessly you’re kept appraised of what those your following are up to. […]

  21. […] But in the last fortnight I’ve switched the mobile phone updates off and managed to cross far more off my to do list than I’d expected. Please don’t label me as one of those people who don’t ‘get’ twitter. I completely understand how great the service is. I love the idea of ambient intimacy and I think use Twitter has really helped build my online reputation. […]

  22. […] Apart from its use as a info resource and publicity tool, Twitter is also a communication platform for individuals and their personal social networks. Leisa Reichelt calls this form of usage, ambient intimacy: Ambient intimacy is about being able to keep in touch with people with a level of regularity and intimacy that you wouldn’t usually have access to, because time and space conspire to make it impossible. […]

  23. […] Apart from its use as a info resource and publicity tool, Twitter is also a communication platform for individuals and their personal social networks. Leisa Reichelt calls this form of usage, ambient intimacy: Ambient intimacy is about being able to keep in touch with people with a level of regularity and intimacy that you wouldn’t usually have access to, because time and space conspire to make it impossible. […]

  25. […] What I enjoyed the most? I never thought I would be saying this, but the canteen! And big time! The choice of dishes and various different options is incredible compared to others I have been to in the past. What I enjoyed the most? Hummm, not sure I thought I would be saying this either, but actually being surrounded by a whole bunch of strangers who are my colleagues (Didn’t know any of them personally, by the way), yet didn’t know much more about them. I guess I have been spoiled by Twitter and its lovely ambient intimacy for just too long! Ha! There I said it! Oh, oh, by the way, have you checked out the awesome 2,5 minutes video put together by the Common Craft folks under Twitter? (Show it to your colleagues, friends & family, because I am sure they are going to love it and learn quite a bit where you have been hanging out all this time! And if you want to get them on board, make them watch it!! Yes, I know, it is that good!!) […]

  27. “Ambient Intimacy” – it’s a really great post.As you see, many people thinks also.THANKS for all your work and good luck on your future projects.

  28. […] One of the terms used to describe Twitter was coined (as far as I know) by Leisa Reichelt, who calls it “ambient intimacy” (a long quote, but worth citing in full): “Ambient intimacy is about being able to keep in touch with people with a level of regularity and intimacy that you wouldn’t usually have access to, because time and space conspire to make it impossible. Flickr lets me see what friends are eating for lunch, how they’ve redecorated their bedroom, their latest haircut. Twitter tells me when they’re hungry, what technology is currently frustrating them, who they’re having drinks with tonight. […]

  30. […] It’s been more than a year now since I first wrote about Ambient Intimacy, and in that year it seems a whole lot has gone on. Twitter continues to be the predominant micro-blogging(?) platform although Google now owns Jaiku. Presence continues to be compelling, yet there hasn’t been the growth in ‘life streaming’ that perhaps we were expecting to occur. Everyone loved FaceBook, and now many of us love to hate it. And we’re all still talking about Portable Social Networks and better tools for managing our social networks across platforms, but we’re not really seeing very much of this in action yet. […]

  31. […] בלוג: כמעשה לבנת הספירויראו את אלהי ישראל ותחת רגליו כמעשה לבנת הספיר וכעצם השמים לטהרצפיה בעמוד הפוסט: כל הגולשיםהוספת תגובה: כל הגולשים אינטימיות אופפת0תגיות: web2.0/ web/ web3.0/ טכנולוגיה/ רשת/ אינטרנט/ טוויטר/ twitter/ facebook/ פייסבוק/ ambient intimacy/ אינטימיות אינטימיות/ אופפת רשת/ חברתית מיקרובלוגינג microblogg0 תגובות יום שני, 7/4/08, 20:38 אחד המונחים שיותר מעניינים אותי כרגע בשיח הטכנוראטי הוא "אינטימיות אופפת" (ambient intimacy, מונח שטבעה לייזה רייכלט). אני רואה בזה המשך טבעי למהפכת הרשת-החברתית של ווב 2.0. […]

  32. Yeah It’s a great thing to be connected with your friends. I haven’t used Twitter and don’t know much about it but sure I’ll sign up.
    ______________
    Pratul
    Wide Circles

  36. I found your post very interesting. I twitter and blog, but sometimes wonder whether it is ambient intimacy or false intimacy. A kind of voyeurism that makes us feel close when we really aren’t. The value of Twitter is not that I know what or when you eat, but I got a chance to read about your thoughts on “the value of twitter.” Excellent post.

  38. […] This is part of a societal change I wrote about in a column for Business 2.0 about the concept of life streams, driven primarily by the rise of ever-pervasive Internet connectivity. My argument was that since humans have an overwhelming need to interact with one another, in this new always-on, increasingly connected society, we would want to mimic our offline interactions online. Instead of using connectivity to just communicate in real time, the world would transition to interacting in real time. It would be a way to share your life with those close to you, no matter how far away. Leisa Reichelt, a smart digital ethnographer, calls it ambient intimacy. […]

  39. […] This is part of a societal change I wrote about in a column for Business 2.0 about the concept of life streams, driven primarily by the rise of ever-pervasive Internet connectivity. My argument was that since humans have an overwhelming need to interact with one another, in this new always-on, increasingly connected society, we would want to mimic our offline interactions online. Instead of using connectivity to just communicate in real time, the world would transition to interacting in real time. It would be a way to share your life with those close to you, no matter how far away. Leisa Reichelt, a smart digital ethnographer, calls it ambient intimacy. […]

  41. […] ha llamado la atención este concepto, ambient intimacy, que conocí ayer a través de uno de los participantes en una conferencia.  Formulado por Leisa […]

  42. […] clondans Me ha llamado la atención este concepto, ambient intimacy, que conocí ayer a través de uno de los participantes en una conferencia.  Formulado por Leisa […]

  49. Ambient intimacy ? A link on a website has brought me here. When as I read about this new online jargon I realized that its interpretation is subject to how open you are to get people to know you. Drawing a parallel with face-face interactions, “ambience” would be the the subway car, the elevator, the waiting room at the doctor’s, the cofffe shop, the snack bar or any public place you stop at and “intimacy” would be engaging in a conversation about yourself and your views with a stranger in a voice loud enough so others could hear and possibly join in. How often do we do that ? Me, personally ? Never. So I can fairly claim that “ambience intimacy” assumes a new dimension when we are away from others, behind our computers or mobile phones (as I am now). For me, it seems to bring me the comfort I would not otherwise have to walk away from any discussion any time I feel like, which come to think of it appears to contradict the very concept of intimacy (that by the way implies “closeness”, “proximity”). Since such “closeness” can only materialize in face-to-face encounter, the bottom line is that maybe the most precise word for it would have been “ambiance small talk”.

  50. (edited)

    Ambient intimacy? A link on a website has brought me here. As I read about this new online jargon I realized that its interpretation is subject to how open you are to get people to know you. Drawing a parallel with face-to-face interactions, ‘ambient’ would be the subway car, the elevator, the waiting room at the doctor’s, the coffee shop, the snack bar or any public place you stop at and ‘intimacy’ would be engaging in a conversation about yourself and your views with a stranger in a voice loud enough so others could hear and possibly join in. How often do we do that ? Me, personally ? Never. So I can fairly claim that ‘ambient intimacy’ assumes a new dimension in our on-line world when we are away from other, behind our computers or mobile phones (as I am now). For me, it seems to bring me the comfort I would not otherwise have to walk away from any discussion any time I feel like, which, come to think of it, appears to contradict the very concept of intimacy (that, by the way, implies ‘closeness’, ‘proximity’). Since such ‘closeness’ can only materialize in face-to-face encounters, the bottom line is that maybe the most precise word for it would have been ‘ambient small talk’.

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