Facebook Revisited

I reactivated my Facebook.
Why?
Because, thanks to my person's help, I won't have to spend time on it and enjoy the ok features it has to offer such as quicker functions than traditional email.
I consider myself a blogger first and no shifting has occurred in the hierarchy, of course.
So, E., a Facebook-er, indeed!

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"Fake Following" per Kotke

Jason Kotke hit it right.
"One of the new features of FriendFeed (a Twitter-like thingie) is "fake following". That means you can friend someone but you don't see their updates. That way, it appears that you're paying attention to them when you're really not. Just like everyone does all the time in real life to maintain their sanity. Rex calls it "most important feature in the history of social networks" and I'm inclined to agree. It's one of the few new social features I've seen that makes being online buddies with someone manageable and doesn't just make being social a game or competition."

Right.

via MR

He, She? Pick One Already!

Facebook is now enforcing gender definitions. The users have to comply and pick the gender box that applies to them.
Per Reuters, "Social network site Facebook will press members to declare whether they are male or female, seeking to end the grammatical device that leads the site to refer to individual users as "they" or "themself.""
I guess, there is hope for grammatical gender in the long run. Thanks to Facebook. Read full feature here.
graph per facebook

Dude, Where's Your Facebook?

I’m a fan of Web 2.0. I say so multiple times a day. I think it empowers the users in unprecedented ways.

I’m also fully cognizant of the fact that the creative class has been enabled like never before. Creatives all over the world know how to get in touch productively with one another, compare and contrast ideas, inspire one another and so forth. The creatives now have the opportunity to exchange ideas and new concepts like never before.

In that regard, I can say unequivocally that I am a genuine believer in the truly democratic power of the egalitarian power of Web 2.0. Unlike Andrew Keen, I don't think that writing is the prerogative of the officially trained person. Anyone who wants to, can. Consequently, the sea of web 2.0 users can decide together yet independently from one another what's good and what isn't. Just look at such uber-popular bloggers out there as Heather B. Armstrong's Dooce, a housewife who operates one of the most successful quotidianity-inspired sites. Oh, and I haven't mentioned Wikipedia yet....

Having expressed that, let me hop on to the topic du jour. Facebook.
You’ve heard of it. You’re perhaps in it. As for me, well:

VENI, VIDI, LEFT.

Here’s a little conversation I had per text message:

-Dude, you’re not on Facebook?!
-Nah, still have the same address though. Come round for some tea, ja?

I believe in the organic way relationships tend to develop and I find settings like myspace or facebook bizarre. For starters, friends, family members, co-workers, acquaintances, performers et al., see one version of you, the only version of you. We live in a world where we have to multi-task and juggle many responsibilities, sometimes contemporaneously, so presenting one’s self only one way is a tad constricting.
Actually, I find the whole setting a haven for affectation.

When it comes to communication, there exists more than one register. There is one appropriate way to communicate with one’s close friends, one way to talk to co-workers, family members, acquaintances, neighbors and so forth.
We reveal where we stand vis-à-vis those around us based on the register we pick.

I can say ‘dude’ around my closed ones, people my age, my music and travel crowd and so forth. However, I can’t employ the term with equal facility while presenting myself professionally. A sporadic ‘dude’ can may grace my rhetoric but it can’t pepper my sentences the way it could at a Muse or Stereophonics concert.

There is space in our relationships that allows for the ubiquitous ‘dude.’ I wouldn’t use lax speech when I’m giving a talk, speaking to people I don’t know, older folk and so forth. Must have something to do with the way I grew up. Or perhaps it’s just plain common sense. Who knows?

I’m sure services like Myspace and Facebook offer great things. Absolutely. I just don’t see the need to have one.

So, readers of mine, in my mind I don’t need to have a Myspace or a Facebook. Let’s see. I have gadgets galore and I know exactly who contacts me and when. Between BlackBerry-ing, texting, emailing, phoning, and oh, before I forget, that elusive face—to-face communication, I know how to reach and be reached.

So, yeah, dude, Facebook no more for me.
graph per facebook

Web 2.0 Eyes on San Francisco This Week

I am of the opinion that Web 2.0 is perhaps the greatest thing to come long since WiFi. Collaborating with other like-minded creatives, blogging, setting up communities of creativity et al., is fundamentally what, I think, will shift much of our routine in the very upcoming future.
Actually, many of our respective routines are already morphed by the elusive Web 2.0. And I'm the better for it. I think.
The main reason why I'm a fan of Web 2.0. however, is because it enables much communication between people who are interested in similar things and who freely share similar notions and ideas.
The creative class is faring better as a whole, I think, because of Web 2.0. I bet Richard Florida is happy with this statement!
The big corporations have now caught on. They are seeing the importance of Web 2.0 and they want a piece of that action, naturally.
Just why flock to San Francisco this week and see what Web 2.0 is all about? Well, there where the people are, there will advertising be, ja?
Ja!

The article the BBC News features today says:

'The report found that consumer giants such as General Motors, McDonald's, Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance and Wells Fargo Bank will drive much of this growth and have already embraced tools like blogs, RSS feeds, podcasting and social networking.
Analyst Oliver Young estimates that another 56% of North American and European companies regard Web 2.0 to be a priority in 2008.

"If I wanted to be anywhere in the Web 2.0 economy, I'd want to be on the enterprise side," says Mr Young.'

And since I'm anticipating some of the questions to be strictly definition-centered, here's how en.wikipedia defines Web 2.0:
"Web 2.0 is a trend in the use of World Wide Web technology and web design that aims to facilitate creativity, information sharing, and, most notably, collaboration among users. These concepts have led to the development and evolution of web-based communities and hosted services, such as social-networking sites, wikis, blogs, and folksonomies."

Eyeball reflecting Facebook logo