The US and the UK have different social norms. American’s express themselves openly, freely and loudly. Meanwhile, the Brits consider themselves to be courteous, quiet and self contained in public spaces.
How do these social norms affect social media habits? A lot.
Native Brit Geoff Dyer described Americans as unintentionally ‘loud’ and ‘crass’ in his 2010 letter to the New York Times. “Americans often seem to have loud voices, but on closer examination, it’s a little subtler than that. Americans have no fear of being overheard,” said Dyer. “Civic life in Britain is predicated on the idea that everyone just about conceals his loathing of everyone else. To open your mouth is to risk offending someone. So we mutter and mumble as if surrounded by informers or, more exactly, as if they are living in our heads.” That may be why public Wi-Fi is less common and more discrete in London than in major US cities and other European cities like Amsterdam and Paris.
