A work friend (@powdernine) sent me a link to this presentation by a Google employee on social networking (http://www.slideshare.net/mobile/padday/the-real-life-social-network-v2).
As I read it, it posits that online social networking has many barriers that need to be removed before it will be fully adopted by users (privacy concerns, the dangers of broadcasting a message to unintended recipients, etc.) But what struck me again and again in this article was that he seemed to as point out all the ways that online social networking was different that offline. And that the challenges would be to create a system of online social networking that was more consistent with meatspace.
I don't think this necessarily so. I think that online social networking is different than what we've done before. It's not a new type of communication but it is a incredibly significant shift in how we present ourselves to others.
Is it about your friends? Or how YOU look to your friends? (Of course it's some of both)
These questions are what people are interested in and I'm not sure it needs to be like it has in the past. Sure we've got the same brains, the same traditions, the same needs. But we're operating inside of a different system. How much power is in the system? Will our past shape our wants and needs of the new system? Or can the system shape our behavior?
One thing is for sure, I would've put more stock in this presentation if it was done by someone from Facebook.
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