Anti-social networking

For an emotionally stunted technologist, I've got some grumpy old man, Luddite-like tendencies. My cellphone, for example, is a Razr which I bought shortly after it came out. You might think I did that because at the time, it was the newest, hottest, sleekest thing. You'd be wrong. I bought it because it was thin and fit comfortably in my pocket. I occasionally take pictures with it, *very* rarely check my mail with it, but mostly just use it for texting and talking. When I upgrade, I'll be getting the newer version because it's smaller, has a better camera, and allegedly a better address book.

That's it. No surfing, no mp3 playing, no video streaming, nothing.

My Ludditism (Ludditeness? Ludditity?) extends to the web. Now, I've been online for a really long time. Back to the early '90s with email, BBSs, and IRC. I wasn't a huge freak, but I chatted, emailed, participated in a few newsgroups, and downloaded my fair share of porn. While I appreciate the need to have an online presence, mine has always been shallow. Hell, I've had a hosted website since '95 that has absolutely nothing on it. Wait, scratch that. There's a link to my resume, but I pulled that old copy of my resume off some time back, so the link is dead.

A few years back, I joined LinkedIn (profile) because it makes perfect sense to me. Here's a tool for professionals to use to expand their *professional* networks. Mine's not huge, but it's a decent size with an adequate number of recommendations. Good for job hunting, though truth be told, no job opportunity through LinkedIn has ever panned out for me. No worries. Someday.

About two years ago, because a couple of my younger friends were on MySpace, I created a profile. I hate that place with a great and burning passion - the poor graphic design, the endless webcam spam, the culture. I have 17 "friends" there, most of whom actually are friends of one sort or another, but it's certainly not where I go to communicate with them. The only thing I do there is send out weekly updates linking back to Sketch War. In fact, I just looked at my public profile and discovered that the Writers Guild is currently on strike. Do I use MySpace the way it's intended? I don't think so. I have a presence, but I just don't *care*. I imagine I'll either let it go fallow or delete it in the next couple of months.

Last fall I created a Facebook profile for work. Not to network, but to get a feel for what it offered and how users interacted with it. I used a fake name - a violation of the TOS so I guess they'll kick me off someday - and have been unable to change it now that I'm using the account. I keep trying, but I remain Joe Blowinski. Seriously? That's some crappy heuristics their software's got if it can't assume that's a fake name. Anyway, I have 25 "friends" on Facebook, the majority of whom are just people I'm working with on an online project. Of the rest, I've only met six in the meat world, and some of those only in passing. That's not to say I'm not close with a few of these people, but by and large they are acquaintances or past/present/potential colleagues more than friends.

Now, while so far Facebook is less annoying and irritating to me than MySpace, there are things that bug the hell out of me. Primarily, all the stupid applets. One or two make sense, and then there are the virtual drinks and virtual pets and even weirder stuff. I don't get it. I know I'm old, but what's the point of a damn (fluff)Friend? Can *anyone* explain the appeal to me?

The final sign of the impending apocalypse is that I signed up for a Twitter account. If you're not reading the RSS feed, you can glance to right and see my Twitter updates, or you can click the link in the last sentence. By all means, "follow" me. Stalk me like a wounded wildebeest. What the hell is the point of Twitter? I mean, like the rest, I've got an account. And like the rest, I don't quite get it.

I can promote my blog¹ and...what? Update my friends and my "friends" as to what I'm doing? Meet people of similar interests, I guess...but I'm not sure how one does that in the 140-character confines of a Twitter message.

Alright...iff² my followers on Twitter were all and only my friends and iff they cared what I was doing from moment to moment, I suppose it would make some small amount of sense to follow me. Easier than me texting everyone to say "I'm going to the market to buy some rutabagas now," at least. But who the hell wants me to text them that, anyway? Criminals, maybe. I guess criminals might like Twitter. It's easier to figure out when someone's house is unoccupied if the residents are faithful Twitter-ers. "Heading out to grandmas, won't be home till very late" is a great cue to break, enter, and rob blind. In ten years, it'll be a new crime. T,B&E.

As with MySpace and Facebook, I'll attempt to use Twitter to drive traffic here. Because I like traffic. As long as I'm not stuck driving in it, I like traffic. Otherwise, it seems like the least interesting and useful of all the social networking tools.

So what's the point? I don't really know. I felt like getting up on my soapbox and yelling at those damn kids to get off my lawn because the end times were nigh, or something. I need to mix in some more metaphors there. I'll work on that. Anyway, the point isn't to get you all to be my Facebook/MySpace/Twitter friends or followers. If you *know* me, or you at least are someone with whom I irregularly communicate, I'm totally cool with that. One of the regular commenters here and I are friends on Facebook. We've never met, and have only interacted a little online, but it's not like she's a complete cypher. Not like the five people I don't know who are already following me on Twitter. That's just creepy.

I guess what I'd really like to do is *understand* the point. Were I keeping in touch with old friends through these tools, I'd get it. I don't get people who have thousands of "friends". No. You don't. In fact, if you have a couple of thousand friends on a social networking site and aren't famous, you probably have *no* friends in real life. Sad, horrible fact. Sorry.

So to the point of understanding, let's have some discussion in the comments of this post. Whether you're a social networking butterfly or think those on social networks should be caught in butterfly nets, pipe in with your thoughts.

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1 Yes, I know I've skipped this happy shiny place in my discussion of my online presence. We established a long time ago that
a) I'm an attention slut
b) I like to have a place that forces me to write
c) I'm good with people!!! I'm a people person!!!

2 No, really. I meant to type the two 'f's. I'm nerdy that way.