Is it normal for people to ask where you are from online?
I had a couple of new followers in bluesky. A new follower DMed me. He asked how I was, I said I was good. Then he asked where I was from and when I said I prefer not to say, he said he understands and that he wanted to know more about me. I told him my interests and such and didn't give any important information about myself. He too told me about his hobbies. Then he asked about my location once again. When I declined once again he said that he understands "not being cool enough to say where you are from". That was an odd thing to say. I got creeped out and blocked him. Is this normal? Why would anyone want to know about each other's location?
It was perfectly normal when he asked the first time, but creepy when he asked again. The “not being cool enough” bit was flat out rude.
Not wanting to doxx yourself is more than reasonable, and I’d expect an internet user to understand that. Blocking him was what I would have done, too.
I sometimes like to know the general area someone's from (country or state), so I understand the context of their experience or point of view. It's not anything I would push if the person felt uncomfortable sharing. That sounds like a red flag.
"Not being cool enough to say where you are from" is a weird way for them to phrase it. If they're British, they might be saying it ironically (I use the phrase "well, if you're not cool enough..." as a reference to the old peer-pressure educational videos myself). Otherwise, they might be young, and clumsily trying to peer-pressure you, or old and out-of-touch enough to think that's an effective way to get a young person to give up information.
So, three options. They're either being ironic, clumsy, or creepy. No harm in playing safe and blocking them.
This sounds like a weird person at best or the prelude to a scam, stalking, or social engineering at worst. You stick with your standards and don't doxx yourself to passive aggressive douchebags, however insistent they may be.
Yeah it's normal, it's one of the first things I ask or get asked when I meet new people online.
It's cool to meet new people from all around the world, so knowing where someone's from is really interesting and gives people stuff to talk about too!
Plus, it's very helpful, because once you know where someone's from you know their timezone, what sort of weather they deal with, you might have some insight into their culture etc to better ensure you don't offend them, or maybe you've visited or love something about their country so again you now have new things to talk about :-D
Anyway yeah, similarly with wanting to know someone's age, location is often one of the first questions we as strangers ask each other in online conversation.
Age is also super useful to know, are we talking to a 12 year old? A 20 year old? A 60 year old? Knowing their age will better inform us of how to have a positive and respectful conversation, it'll inform us of what part of their life there in and thus we can take guesses to their generational cultural norms and interests, if they're likely to have a career, or be married, or if they're likely still in education studying for their masters, etc etc.
You don't need to know an EXACT age, just as you don't need to know an EXACT location, but "I'm in my 20s from England" is a more than appropriate response :-)
Bottom line: Always trust your gut if someone seems weird online (especially if they're pushy for info you're unwilling to share), but don't assume they're weird just because they want to know some basic details like A/S/L 👍
To me there is nothing wrong with asking or stating what country you are from. Unless you are from a really tiny country it doesn't really matter if you state your country. For example I'm from the US which doesn't tell you anything really about my exact location.
The US is about 3,000 miles across. That doesn't included Hawaii or Alaska. It's about 1,582 miles from top to bottom of the US again not including Hawaii or Alaska.
So my saying I'm from the US doesn't give up much really but it gives people an idea about something about me and my heritage.
So are you from the east coast, or the west? Statistically you aren't in the middle, and you are more likely from the east as that is the most densely populated. So you are likely in one of ~10 states on the east.
Still not great for pinpointing, but a toooooooon of the US is a whole lotta nothing. Similar to Aus.
I get this once in a while during online games, it's normal to want to know where somebody is playing from. I just usually just say my country name. I once had a random teammate who is practically my neighbor, The server crashed before I can take note of his in game name.
Since the early days of Facebook, most people have been in roughly two camps: those who share just about anything, and those who share barely anything. Ok, there are also privacy minded people who share nothing at all, but that’s a different story.
People in the first category just love to tell you where they live, how many pets they have, send photos of everything etc. You know, social people. They also expect you the be like them, because that’s how tribalism works. It’s the default setting in the human brain, and disabling or even just limiting that urge takes some some skill and effort.
People in the second category share only a few opinions, but never their location or photos. I think most people on Lemmy are like this.
Most of my random DMs are some sort of business marketing pitch or slow burn confidence scammer. I wouldn't volunteer any real information about yourself until you get to know them better. And even then, especially the crypto scammers, are willing to do the slow burn because they're going for a larger jackpot of your life savings.
I tell everyone "I have a policy for never doing business with anyone I never met face to face."
Guy from HK in my DMs trying to get me to video call him.
There are plenty of scammers out there too, but some people are just lonely or curious. They might’ve just recently got internet and the only interaction they’ve had previously is from within their slum.