Social Networks At A Crossroads 97
mateuscb writes "A few years ago, social networking Web sites were just some newfangled technology that college students loved. But over time, they have metamorphosed into an unavoidable Internet phenomenon that is changing the way people of all ages keep in touch with friends, find long-lost acquaintances, explore new hobbies and even look for employment."
unavoidable? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:1)
Re:unavoidable? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Not everyone follows everybody else's "cultural trends". He needs to hang with friends who aren't so narrow minded.
Re: (Score:2)
The initial draw was finding long-lost friends and aquaintences, but I keep going back for the social event organizing features. I still usually send out an email, but people's addresses change and sometimes someone gets missed. And if
Re: (Score:1)
Trouble is they aren't standard. So I have invites from friends in so many different services where as they could just have a group on e-mail that included me like most people do. I don't want to be sucked into different commercial entity money making schemes because my friends aren't very discerning and don't understand the underpinnings picking something that includes everyone they might want to.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:unavoidable? (Score:5, Interesting)
My senior year of high school, cell phones were divided into two classes - "Mobile Phones" which were a brick with a handset attached that you kept in your car, and "Cellular Phones" which looked much like the phones you buy today but four times the size. Nobody who didn't have a full time job as a salesman had one.
Four years later, the mobile brick phones were gone, cell phones were cheap enough that almost everyone I knew had one, and Instant Messaging had become mainstream.
I noticed in that time that when they were constantly available, people became extremely loathe to make any concrete plans at all. Whereas four years before, I could say, "Hey, tonight lets meet at 7 at the club" and expect a yes or no response, after everyone had a cell phone the response was, "Well, uhh, just call me on my cell." Getting a group of people together was no longer a matter of setting a date time, and being able to reasonably expect them to show up, it now required 15,000 phone calls.
I don't know how it happened, but cell phones and IM turned everyone into 14-year-old girls.
Now if I'm expected to check your web site every day to see if you're having a party instead of the courtesy of a phone call or email, thanks, but no thanks.
As such, I don't blame your friend in the least for not wanting to participate in the drama of keeping in touch with people like that.
Re: (Score:2)
Might could also be that all of the "Maybe" responses you get nowadays due to people being easily available via cell phones would previously just have been "No" responses because people didn't know whether or not they could make it at the time they were asked.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
You're assuming that my whole world revolves around providing entertainment for people with cell phones. It does not, as much as they like to think it does.
And I find the implicit "Well, sure, unless something better comes along" that goes along with the "maybe" to be insulting. There's something to be said for making a committment and keeping it, especially among friends.
Re: (Score:2)
I wonder how he feels about evites [evite.com] (or similar sites)? Is evite a social networking site? Would he refuse to respond to evites on the same grounds? Let me guess, your roommate is a party-goer (when he happens to be invited) -- and not a party organizer.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Damn that's pretty cold man. He's within your circle of friends. He's your *room-mate*. May be, you should just look away from your myspace page long enough to turn your head, initiate eye contact, and tell him about the parties he's been invited to.
Is it safe? (Score:2)
Your real name, hobbies, interests, spending patterns, perhaps your work experience etc etc.
Potential employers will be able to google you, and once your stuff in there, it never goes completely away, even if you edit or delete the page. So the law forbids them to ask for your age, gender, sexual preference, political affiliation, drinking habits etc etc, they won't have to, they can just google for it. You'll never know.
It is a
Re:unavoidable? (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Then how do you get your self-esteem, if you aren't using social networks?
Personally, I find insulting people's parentage on antisocial networks quite rewarding. Your mileage may vary. :-)
In specially marked boxes of Bachelor Chow (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
It's all part of the same chaos that's underway these days. Things are going to get really nasty before long. When sex is an anytime-thing, means nothing to the relationship, and can be seen all the time, it loses it's joy...leaving the person empty. (Just one example)
The current move is to destroy ALL traditions. That way, a future generation won't
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I have nothing against the concept, it's just that the vast majority of social networking site users (especially Myspace) are people I do not want to have any contact with whatsoever.
"and even look for employment" (Score:5, Funny)
"and even look for privacy" (Score:1, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Really? (Score:2)
Perfect Validation (Score:2)
I've been questioned like this before over the phone - a financial institution that questioned me asked me questions from "publicly available information" which "confirmed that I am who I say I am." (The way they did it was to ask me multiple choice questions about my address from
Linked In? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Linked In? (Score:5, Funny)
What the hell does that mean? Professional social networking?
Prostitutes? Drug dealers?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, if your 'massage therapist' or your 'herb specialist' check their email often, they would be included too.
Basically, it's anyone with work experience that has regular email access. I guess you could use your friendster account or your facebook account to network professionally, but most people (I believe) prefer to keep their personal lives separate from their professional ones (even if the separation is only on
Summary of the article... (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Your a Geek. It's Saturday. You're not doing anything else. You're hoping that, by some magic, Slashdot will help you with your (a)social life?
Next Question!
Unavoidable? (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
The irony is that when I went, Google showed an ad for a social networking site.
Re: (Score:1)
it makes sense (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
I'm impressed thus far, although I would say I'm not too interested in continuing those friendships through an online site, each time its moved to real world visits, phone calls and emails. That I like.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:it makes sense (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:it makes sense (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Same here. My ex was actually mildly stalking. The last thing I would ever do is to post lots of details of my private life so she could monitor me from the comfort of her home.
The situation is much worse for women and children. People browse those sites looking for victims and can use everything people post in them against them.
You are probably safer just leaving all the curtains to your house/apartment wide open 24 hours a
Re: (Score:1)
Grrrr... paid journalism... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:1)
My hypothesis is that the majority of the 'internet-population' would have a hard time to come up with an idea of what this might be
CC.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
Fine Grained Privacy Is Not New (Score:3, Insightful)
The new imeem is way cooler.
"Unavoidable phenomenon" (Score:4, Interesting)
And here's the part I *don't* get -- all the comments from people saying "I don't have time to keep up with friends and family, but since I joined {Facebook/Myspace/etc} we can keep in touch and make new friends..." WTF? Maybe if you peeled your fat ass away from the computer and spent time with family and friends and maybe got involved with some activities you could make new friends.
Maybe its just Wall Street greed coupled with the myopia of 20 somethings.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
When I'm heading home for the summer, and I think to myself, "Hey, it would be cool to hang out with my old HS buddies. I wonder what they're up to." I can start up facebook, search for them by name, friend them, and get their phone numbers.
I don't have a little address book like my parents did until r
Re: (Score:1)
False assumption (Score:2)
Or MAYBE I can do BOTH! I frequently go out and converse with new people and make new friends... however I have some really good friends that I don't want to lose track of, and Facebook happens to provide a wonderful solution to that. If I had to correspond via letters, phone calls and long trips... I would have lost touch with many
In other news, green is the new black! (Score:4, Insightful)
But over time, they have metamorphosed into an unavoidable Internet phenomenon
I'd call this a sad commentary on the steadily advancing age-of-first-real-job, not an "internet phenomenon". YMMV. In any case, I've managed to avoid them quite well, thankyouverymuch.
changing the way people of all ages keep in touch with friends
No, not really. The afforementioned "college kids who haven't moved on yet" use it to keep in touch. The rest of us still use the phone or email or, wonder-of-wonders, physically meeting one another.
and even look for employment.
"Look". Not "find".
These folks have a rather rude awakening to look forward to... The rest of the world really doesn't give two shakes of a rat's ass about their pathetic little ego-pages. It doesn't care about their blogs, their favorite bands, their pictures of their cat/dog/iguana/fish-named-bob.
Your future employer doesn't care about Bob-the-fish. He cares that you have the ability to work, in person, with others, and get the job done. The fact that you can't differentiate between "friends" and "people you've never met but add to a counter on your website" doesn't really help with that.
Re:In other news, green is the new black! (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd disagree...the fact that I have moved on (2000 miles from where 90% of my friends live) is precisely the reason I use it to keep in touch. It's not a substitute for phone calls, emails, and personal visits, but I can't afford a $300 trip to meet up for coffee with a friend, and time zone differences often makes phone convos difficult with more than immediate family. I think each form of medium has a place along a spectrum of options - personal visits -> video calls -> phone calls -> emails -> social networking blogs -> twitter -> shouting from a mountaintop.
These folks have a rather rude awakening to look forward to... The rest of the world really doesn't give two shakes of a rat's ass about their pathetic little ego-pages. It doesn't care about their blogs, their favorite bands, their pictures of their cat/dog/iguana/fish-named-bob.
But that's the great/worst thing about the Internet - you can put up anything, and whether anyone really cares is a moot point. But undeniably, there is someone is crazy enough to care.
Friends (Score:1)
It's all a fad type website idea, it'll pass.
* I personally don't use those kind of sites.
** Delete as appropriate.
Social networking seems kind of over (Score:5, Interesting)
Social networking sites seem to me to be kind of over. A few years ago I was active on a few of them; Tribe and Nerve were fun. But the fun sites are over. Myspace is just the new AOL.
Phone-based social networking is probably where things are going. Although, interestingly, the iPhone doesn't have social networking. Helio does, but nobody uses Helio.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
Could someone help me out (Score:1)
I missed out on them when I was in college because I was busy going out to bars, playing sports, seeing plays, and generally being social. Then I graduated and got busy going on dates, volunteering, and traveling with friends.
So, what was I missing?
Re: (Score:2)
It's like an e-peen about real life: "Hey everybody! Look at all the awesome stuff I'm doing IRL!! Aren't I awesome!!!two!11"
By the look of your post, it doesn't seem like you're missing anything at all -- just not for the reason you imply
Unavoidable? (Score:1)
Growth Rate Peaked Last Year (Score:2, Interesting)
http://www.realmeme.com/roller/page/realmeme/?entry=social_networking_meme_verified [realmeme.com]
I predicted MySpace's peak in growth early in 2006, almost coincident to when it occurred. The introduction of Facebook's third party API is a sign of an industry entering a consolidated and standardization phase.
Social networking vs. real life (Score:2)
This is probably the first or second graduating class who spent their entire college career exposed to the social networking phenomenon. I think this is going to further drive apart the generational gaps that exist in workplaces.
I'm actually in the middle; I went to college just as the web was becoming popular. It was a really neat toy...sites like Yahoo and online retailers were just getting started. We used it just like that...a
Re: (Score:2)
The other day I was watching 'The Big Sleep' (1946) with Humphry Bogart and Lauren Bacall. At one point the DA's man is taking down Bogart's testimony regarding a case. The camera cuts the the sheet of paper to reveal he is writing lines of what appear to me to be incomprehensible jibberish. I exclamed "What the hell lanquage is that?!" to which my girlfriend replied: "That's shorthand, its how people used to write quickly before touchtyping [wikipedia.org]".
Given that people commonly compose emails on thier phones or PD
Re: (Score:1)
Surely not.
What possible reason could a social networking site have for not appealing to the anti-social?
Enterprise Social Computing. (Score:1)
Many VPs, Directors, CXOs, do not understand why social computing is so 'in' thing may be (they are old) but the youngsters do understand it.
In the US especially, with the huge number of experienced people retiring in the next 5 years and some young blood joining the ranks, it is important in two aspects to implement social software in the enterprises too.
The knowledge of the old will be lost if not captured. But any amount of
Standards Now! (Score:2)
Why Don't I Like Social Networking Sites? (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The risks of interview candidates missing out on job opportunities because of MySpace profiles is a well-documented situation. I have seen real life examples of this.
Re: (Score:2)
Which one? (Score:1)
Myspace is messy by design but the prepubesant little shits like the colours and crap and seems to be the most popular.
Bebo, hi-5 and the rest are smaller and less useful.
Its like IM again, some use AIM, some yahoo and others msn - all offering a different experience and you end up going where your friends are... like it all n
Quite Easily Avoidable (Score:1)
Everything old is new again (Score:4, Insightful)
It's both amusing and frustrating to see the BBS spoken of as a technology of yesteryear, while mainstream Internet culture gets closer and closer to being an exact duplicate of BBS culture. Strip away all of the fancy buzzwords and you've basically got the same thing: people connecting to each other online.
As a BBS sysop of nearly 20 years (please visit us online!) [citadel.org] I can say with certainty that nothing has changed. Everything old is new again. And may I say to the "Web 2.0" and "social network" people: you didn't invent it.
Re: (Score:2)
They're as much as social network as random forum about linux.
Re: (Score:1)
Ditto. In many (most) ways, the transition from BBS to Web was a huge step backwards. HTML+CSS and HTTP blow. It took a long time, using these hacks, to recreate the functionality we had with BBSes. The ubiquity of TCP/IP (connectivity) won the day, but a lot was lost in the switch over.
It's a PR hit (Score:2)