“Pulling a Mylie”- I don’t think so

Social networking is always interesting to watch as it grows and evolves. After watching this video there is some agreement. But I want to point to the niches of social networking sites. When I started college in 2004 Facebook was just starting up. By Spring 2005 I had my own Facebook account and at this time Facebook was only open to college students and faculty at particular universities. I would log on to ask my buddy from class what the homework was or find is telephone number and send him or her a text about meeting up for lunch. It was a great way to connect to classmates and peers at college.

Facebook then was the equivalent of what LinkedIn is now. It was explicitly open to only college students and that made it special. It was an elite enclave only open to those who were currently in college not the high school drop out you never really liked that much anyway. That person had Myspace. And Myspace in my young and immaturity at the time always associated with the “rift raft”. The folks who worked at Wal-Mart and took their cashed paychecks to Hot Topic. Facebook was clean and organized, no loud profile music. At the time all you could do was add your profile picture, add some info about yourself, and write on walls. By Spring 2006 you could add pictures to the site which I remember being huge addition. Soon it was opened up to high school students which infuriated many.

Finally two things happened almost simultaneously. Facebook stopped marketing itself as a social networking site for the young in college but opened itself up to the general public. Then they added the infamous news feed. It lost its special place. Soon Myspace was abandoned and everyone flocked to Facebook where my inbox was flooded with friend requests.

Now I am finding little need for Facebook. I prefer the anonymous nature 0f my blog and of twitter. That is the benefit. Twitter serves a niche and allows one to create their own social networked rather than it being created by them. Twitter is a marketplace of ideas, while Facebook seeks to do this with its news feed it is frequently clogged with status updates from friends and family you rather not talk to but am too shy to remove as friends. I much prefer twitter where I am able to simply ask to follow only those I truly enjoy to listen to. It’s very informal and in that informality I get lots of great nuggets of information.

In an instant I am forwarded to a webpage or news story having to do with something im interested in rather than realizing how many dumb Republican friends I have via Facebook’s news feed. Don’t get me wrong Facebook does have its practical advantages but outside my young college days it just doesn’t work for what I want out of the web anymore. My blog and twitter are all the social networking I need and I can get it without being haunted by my middle school crush or my sister in-law.