Social Software Presentation for the Lunch and Learn series at Johnson County Community College
I’ve included notes and links for Social Software presentation at JCCC’s Center for Business, including links to Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn, as well as my profiles. You should join my network when you join all of these!
I’ve included links to social software for your use. If you create an account, please let know and I’ll add you to my network. I’m not fatigued, yet.
The Well The original social network, unless you count Usenet, now Google Groups. For a WELL account, a real name and email address was required. Anonymity was not part of the model, which encouraged people to state their cases with some forethought. Most of the time.
Facebook 67 million accounts. 250k added daily. 6th most popular visited site, if you count unique visits. Zuckerberg is a billionaire, and is either greedy because he won’t sell out or greedy because he will sell out, according to Cringley on social networks. Cringely and his commenters may be right about the generational divide in the social software arena.
Krieger’s Facebook profile
Twitter
Krieger on Twitter
ma.gnolia
Krieger on ma.gnolia
Flickr
350+ social networking sites More social networking sites than you can join in a lifetime. Get millions of friends! And invite all of your friends to join!
Facebook fatigue What happens when following the above note.
Several intersections of contemporary societal trends appear with these tools. One is the tension between anonymity and self-promotion. Loss of privacy is often decried by many web users. But with these tools, many people reveal themselves, perhaps too completely. To mangle an old expression and reverse its meaning, “what is put on the web stays on the web.” All of this information is picked up by the search engines, and with Google caching everything, and the Wayback Machine archiving everything, personal information is spread across the web. Consider this from an employer’s standpoint, as I can just as easily Google someone for their background, likes, dislikes, motivations, political inclinations, indiscretions, good or bad behavior, and potentially reams of information about their personal lives. Why bother calling for references, when a potential employee puts everything on show.
The generational divide may also drive the use of these tools. Facebook’s 12-to-34 age demographic would seem to share some characteristics. These might include being comfortable with digital tools and content, the need to establish one’s place in the tribe, time available to spend on grooming one’s network, and the need to connect. Once age enters into the picture, less time is available for these computer mediated pursuits. Another possibility is that networking in a face-to-face environment can be difficult. Developing friends takes time, effort, and risk of exposure. These tools eliminate most of those barriers. But adding a friend to your Facebook network would seem to come at the cost of commitment and emotional connection. A cynical thought is that social networks allow people to discard “friends” just as easily.
Or maybe it is just a new way to keep score, as chronicled at the excellent So Good blog. And if you are very unsure about Facebook’s intentions, you’ll find Tom Hodgkinson’s articlein the Guardian(UK) worth the time.