Social networks

Paper people A friend asked me today: “Do you have a Facebook?”
My quick answer was: “Of course not, I am a geek!”

Then it made me think, what is it that makes geeks hate the new social networks hype? It’s not like we are unfamiliar or feel uncomfortable, come on, we create these things for breakfast! 🙂 And there definitely is an issue with geeks and social networks – all my geek friends avoid them, at least the fashion ones. It does not matter where everybody is, I just don’t care if I get a thousand invitations to Facebook, MySpace, Hi5, etc. And it is not like we don’t have social contacts also. It’s more like “you go into that fancy place and mingle with the fancy people. If you want to contact me, come where I am”.

So far so good. But then again, where am I? And most importantly, what makes it different from the other places where people communicate on the Internet?
I am on Twitter, I even have 2 accounts – one personal and one for the blog. I am on LinkedIn. I am on Jamendo. I may even be on some, or even most of the other social networks, but I am not really on them.

What is common between all of these places – they are not commercial. Even though Twitter is so popular, it is somehow clean. No marketing, no spam, no SEO bullshit. It got out of nowhere, some people were just having fun, others thought it is fun too. Another thing common is privacy – you are not bugged 20 times a day with invitations for mindless activities, fake causes and not embarrassed by someone, who thought it is very funny to share a picture of you when you had a bad day. Without asking you do you mind, or giving you any choice. And it is more personal too. You are not part of the crowd, it is like going out with friends.

What do you think about it? How is it for you? And don’t forget to share this within your social network! 😉

[Image by Davide Guglielmo, taken from www.sxc.hu]

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2 Responses to “Social networks”

  1. Michel says:

    You are not part of the crowd, it is like going out with friends.

    This is so well said! Twitter is cool — no ads, no stupid “Let us make a virtual farm and raise virtual sheep there” games or tests “Find out if you would sleep with Al Pacino or Robert DeNiro”… 😉

    So Facebook is popular, but I don’t like it. It is annoying. And not well thought on the inside.

    I certainly use Twitter, LinkedIn and… hmm, well that’s it, I think. Both services are not annoying so this is maybe why I like them…

    Now I am heading off to Twitter to share this cool article… :))

  2. [vladi] says:

    @Michel: You’re a geek too 😉