An interesting topic in the blogosphere at the moment is the idea of social network overload. I don’t suffer from this, as I try to use as few as I can, but I get frustrated when I see yet another site with no idea behind it except socialising is launched.
Do I have an account on MySpace? Nope. Do I have an account on Bebo? Nope. What about Facebook? Nope. Why? Am I not very sociable? Probably, but that’s not the reason I don’t use them. I spend enough time using instant messaging networks; I don’t need another way to waste my time online.
I use last.fm not for its social aspect but to find music and collect statistics. I use Flickr to share my photos with other people to use (Creative Commons) and vice-versa. I use YouTube for entertainment. I use MSN to have a private conversation.
What exactly does MySpace do for the world besides teaching people sloppy HTML, destroying friendships over absences on people’s top 8 lists and forcing people to listen to their friends’ poor tastes in music? MySpace perhaps does help musicians but there are better (from a point of view features & not clientèle size) better sites such as GarageBand.
I fail to see how social networking is fun nor how its productive. Perhaps it’s useful for business people yet I’m fairly sure blogs or such would be better for them to make contact.
I don’t do social networking (as bad as that might be for a Web 2.0 blogger!) and I’m tired of hearing about services like Twitter or a new five-lettered one which fail to do anything.
Give me some insightful comments and pingbacks.
Tags: social networking, social networks, web2.0, web2, web 2.0, web 2
Hi Joe, I’m with you. MySpace is not only over-hyped, but it has proven itself to be a smut joint and a dangerous way for kids to be lulled into situations they shouldn’t. It astonishes me that legitimate businesses have actually taken the time to create their own presence there. And Twitter? Don’t get me started.
What a waste of people’s time.
No, there are other better ways to socialize online.
I’ve gotten jobs through LinkedIn and have helped others get jobs through LinkedIn.
Dunno about the others, though.
I agree with you. But what should it do?
[...] Facebook/MySpace/Twitter/Flickr et al help you get your stuff done? Debate in the comments. And what exactly does it do? [Webby’s [...]
Overall the whole networking stuff is just a craze. I don’t think many social networking sites will survive – only those with the best set of functions and services. That is way all these networks start their own APIs so they mutate into a flickr, YouTube and Google docs Übersite.
These networks repeat the hype of the portals of the early startup days: they try to be the solution for everything and stuff themselfs with more and more functions. So they get bloated like Yahoo! is today and loose users.
@Crispin: LinkedIn is not a social network, but a business network.
I have tried, really hard, to find a use for social networking sites, but they just aren’t for me. MySpace is for my kids, Facebook is for their older cousins, BoomJ and similar sites are just overt attempts to sell crap to me. I just haven’t found a place where I can find people like me – too young to be a boomer, too old to be a gen Xer, “Gen Jones”? – give me a break…
If anyone can find a place for kids from the 70s, who smoked weed because we couldn’t afford anything harder, chanted “Disco Sucks!” but went to discos to try to get laid, listened to Led Zeppelin in public but thought, privately, that “Detroit Rock City” was a pretty good tune, and are now thinking of retiring in our late forties because we all have diabetes and are wondering if we’ll make it to our sixties, …let me know.
I still will probably not visit the site more than once, because it’s all just tedious nonsense anyway.
I actually find facebook to be a useful tool. I have about 1200 friends on there whom I know 10% well, and another 30% as friends that I rarely talk to, and the rest are people that I acquaint with or am planning on meeting. I’ve met many people through this tool.
Someone posts an event (usually me), and people come out to it, and if I recognize someone, I’m more open with them. Either way, I’ve met many people through facebook, or keep in touch with people I’ve met through the social networking site/tool.
As you may know, I wrote about this recently – in my No more social networks! post.
I really do sympathise with the way you get frustrated when you see yet another site with no idea behind it except socialising. I feel very much the same way, even though I am passionate about Internet technologies.
Nobody seems to be innovating anymore.
“Rah rah rah, I’m an angry curmudgeon who doesn’t see the fun in these flashy, impractical internet trends.”
I’m not denying that we’re suffering from social network overload–not every function of an online life needs to have a social angle–but that doesn’t invalidate the concept.
I’ve found old high school friends and reconnected with them through MySpace. People I know regularly use Facebook to send out invitations to social gatherings. It’s fun to see what other people consider to be their most important interests/hobbies.
None of this is too mind blowing, and sites offering these functions have been around for a while, but it seems like the current offerings are more fun and usable, and have finally drawn enough people in to be worthwhile.
As for communication, instant messaging and e-mail are good if you need to have a more serious, in depth discussion with someone who’s not accessible by phone or in person, but messaging on a site like Facebook somehow seems casual but attention-grabbing enough to be perfect for random back-and-forth with friends. Also, what if you simply let a friend know that you’re thinking of them at 2 AM? Throw up a LOLcat picture on their MySpace wall!
It is ridiculous what you see on those sites, not only are they dangerous to kids, they are unproductive and inappropriate in general.
I strongly disagree – services such as Twitter are both useful and fun way to do various staff – you are writing in your blog – so how this differs from mini blogging via Twitter – of course there is room for improvement in almost all social networks out there
Interesting article in Wired about the usefulness of services like Twitter and Pownce.
http://www.wired.com/techbiz/media/magazine/15-07/st_thompson
my blog has gotten 1000x more traffic from just random google searches than my myspace page. But OTOH, i have networked with some great people via twitter. I think its for sure a YMMV thing.
THANK you. I never thought I’d see something like this on the web. Social networking is overrated. (I deleted my facebook about a month after a few of my friends made me sign up for one.)
I keep hearing my friends complain about how they’re blowing so much time on facebook and myspace reading comments and writing on people’s “walls”… I keep thinking, “okay, why do you do it if it’s such a waste of time?”
I probably sound old-fashioned (for an 18-year-old in this digitized society) saying this, but the best way to get to know other people is to sit down and have a nice long talk with them. My experience tells me that this uber-secretive traditional technique (!) leads to deeper and longer-lasting friendships.
[...] Other people seem to be feeling very much the same way. Take Joe Anderson of Webby’s World, for instance – he’s asking what exactly all these new social networks do? [...]
I agree that there are too many social network site these days. I disagree that it’s unproductive. As an indie filmmaker, I find other filmmakers on MySpace who has similar mind. I get music video gigs from the indie bands on MySpace whom want to make their music video. I use Bebo as to contact with the others friends who are not on MySpace. I used Facebook to contact with the other friends who doesn’t use MySpace, nor Bebo.
I found the used of those sites as to advertise myself out there, instead of have to go out day by day and looking for work. Let me say it, filmmaking is not a full time job. One film is done, it’s done. I have to find another people who are doing another film. Jumping from one set to another. I end up have to use the social networking sites, to do the actual “social networking” with people (strangers) from all around the world. As well as from phone call to phone call, and e-mail to email. It’s just like having lots of blogs to advertise myself, but I don’t do blog.
I found MySpace to be use more for finding film and music video works. Bebo to connect with my old friends (who I’ve lost contact with). Facebook to contact another filmmakers out there who doesn’t like teen-look on Bebo and MySpace. I hope someone will lunch a site where it bring all these social networking sites into one place soon (like Trillian for IM [software], for example).
What I like about the social networking sites is mostly the ability to find old friends from high school and college. I don’t like making friends with people i don’t know, but i do like getting updates from my favorite bands and up and coming bands who don’t really have real PR other than myspace. I think it’s a good tool if used properly, used with a purpose, but so is the internet, which can be a mindless source of NOTHING in general. I’m happy that I can see the faces of people I thought I’d never see again, see how they’re doing, without having to interrupt their lives. People don’t always have the capacity to update all their friends on events in their lives, but it doesn’t mean they don’t think you should know.
As a college student, Facebook has been invaluable in keeping in touch with friends, maintaining and developing current and future professional contacts (it’s nice to be able to befriend future investment advisors, for instance), find classmates to get notes from classes I’ve missed, keep contact information current (though I really *love* Plaxo for that), and to just have fun — such as tagging and being tagged in photos with friends.
MySpace, on the other hand, is utter crap, in my opinion. It has no sense of community and isn’t driven by the exclusive “in crowd” philosophy that makes Facebook so great.
I’m in total agreement with you. It’s absolutely ridiculous these days as to the kinds of applications being built around the most ridiculous idea, just because it’s “social.” It’s absurd and annoying. I, too, don’t have a myspace, twitter, pownce, facebook, bebo, whatever, account. I love to read interesting things online, and I do post to my site, but it’s for my own reasons, that doesn’t include pleasing a network of people I don’t know. I don’t consider myself to be anti-social, but I don’t have any desire to be wrapped up in the ugliness that is social software.
ummm… why should it be productive? That seems silly – it’s about socialising (or a form of it)! I enjoy Facebook, but I certainly wouldn’t call my time on it productive – and if I let it eat into time that I should be doing something productive, then I have absolutely nobody but myself to blame for it! Jeepers, take some personal responsibility folks!
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