19 April 2020
While watching CBS Sunday Moring, I came across a segment on videoconferencing and seeing into the homes of people whose homes we do not often get to see. Amid comments on various celebrity’s videoconferencing backgrounds, they had commented on how bland and professional Lady Gaga’s home office seemed to be, comparing it to her usually eclectic sense of style. I thought to myself that it was a bit out of place for Lady Gaga to have such a bland office space with white walls and plain chrome office furniture. Why did I care about, or even think about the state of Lady Gaga’s home? Did I have it in my head, before all of this, that Lady Gaga’s home would be awash in colour and adorned with bold décor? It turns out that until now, I had never really thought about Lady Gaga’s home decorating tastes let alone the preferences of random people around me.
In these bizarre times of physical distancing, while we are not able to physically visit the homes of our friends and families, we are being let in to the homes of many people whom would have never had thought to invite us in. On the flipside, we are letting people in to our homes whom we would have never thought to invite. Videoconferencing on Zoom, Skype and Google Hangouts has replaced everything from business meetings and university classes to birthday parties and even weddings.
A few weeks ago, my father was preparing for his first ever Zoom meeting. He meticulously set his camera’s angle by placing books under his laptop and made sure that everything about the background he had chosen was perfect. Since he was using the living room as a backdrop, he made sure that all of the pillows on the couch were straight and that all of the coffee table books were arranged properly. He even employed me for a test call. After assuring him that everything was going to go ok, he was off to the races.
After considering my father’s meticulous attention to detail with his Zoom meeting and Lady Gaga’s seemingly conservative home office space, I realized a few things about beaming into people’s homes via these videoconferencing applications. The first thing I realized is that people are now using their homes to express themselves to strangers in addition to the usual expressions like clothing and makeup. In my father’s context, everything from the camera angle he chose, to his arrangement of the living room was meant to exude professionalism and culture. Lady Gaga, who was speaking about worldwide COVID-19 benefit concert that she was organizing with the World Health Organization, may have wanted to appear more unassuming and modest within the context she was speaking about due to the gravity of the situation. Then again, it could just have been that her computer happened to be there at the time she was speaking with reporters. The second thing I realized, is that we are anxious about these new online experiences we are having. On top of the sudden change of shelter-in-place and stay home orders that is making us all anxious, we are now being asked to let strangers into our home. Generally speaking, the home is a place where friends and family gather. We are now letting our unknown co-workers, unknown classmates, and even the whole world (in Lady Gaga’s case) into our homes.
These changes are strange, but we are going to be living with them until COVID-19 is under control.
Luciano Cesta 