the facebook argument
I'm not anti-"web 2.0" (god, I hate that phrase), but I don't believe in the lemmingesque (that should *so* be a word) behavior of simply joining all these sites and services just for the sake of it.
Other than LJ (which I have used very infrequently over the past year) the only two "social networking" sites I have accounts with are LinkedIn (which I like as a business contact manager) and Plaxo (which was nothing more than an online address book when I first started using it and has since developed grander aspirations that do not interest me).
You would actually have to pay me to visit MySpace. It's like "bad" found the internet and went all 'splody. I admit that I didn't *get* Twitter for a long time, and I still don't want to be drawn into the potential time-sink that it is, but I confess I now see valid uses for it, since my boss started tweeting updates for our web site.
Then there's Facebook. I really don't feel the need or want to be drawn into it. If I were to say the name "Friendster", some people would roll their eyes and others would giggle. There really isn't a big difference, and I'm quite firm in my belief that 5 years from now, Facebook will be remembered in the same way - a thing of the past and seen as rather pointless. *BUT* an increasing number of friends (4 in the past 3 days) are bugging/telling me that "I really should" and "I need to" and "how great it is". I also missed an invite to an event because someone was only using Facebook to let friends know about it (a bad plan IMHO, but still).
So do I need another site to distract me at work? Another site to update and keep tabs on? Another place for all my personal information to leak out? It seems the answer is that I do, but don't want to. =P
Thoughts? Opinions? Personal experiences?
Other than LJ (which I have used very infrequently over the past year) the only two "social networking" sites I have accounts with are LinkedIn (which I like as a business contact manager) and Plaxo (which was nothing more than an online address book when I first started using it and has since developed grander aspirations that do not interest me).
You would actually have to pay me to visit MySpace. It's like "bad" found the internet and went all 'splody. I admit that I didn't *get* Twitter for a long time, and I still don't want to be drawn into the potential time-sink that it is, but I confess I now see valid uses for it, since my boss started tweeting updates for our web site.
Then there's Facebook. I really don't feel the need or want to be drawn into it. If I were to say the name "Friendster", some people would roll their eyes and others would giggle. There really isn't a big difference, and I'm quite firm in my belief that 5 years from now, Facebook will be remembered in the same way - a thing of the past and seen as rather pointless. *BUT* an increasing number of friends (4 in the past 3 days) are bugging/telling me that "I really should" and "I need to" and "how great it is". I also missed an invite to an event because someone was only using Facebook to let friends know about it (a bad plan IMHO, but still).
So do I need another site to distract me at work? Another site to update and keep tabs on? Another place for all my personal information to leak out? It seems the answer is that I do, but don't want to. =P
Thoughts? Opinions? Personal experiences?