5 ms·

If I have any social networking anxiety, it's not about friend count. It's anxiety over wasting my life catering to wannabe web personalities trying to build a

by pstack 15y ago

If I have any social networking anxiety, it's not about friend count. It's anxiety over wasting my life catering to wannabe web personalities trying to build a following via attention-whoring or wasting precious moments of my life scrolling through every mundane update every idiot on my list posts when their new baby farts (or, worse, the ultra sound images and the nine months of constant uninteresting updates that follow). Am I a snob for not giving a fuck about every single second of your life? Fine. Call me a snob, then. My time is too precious to waste stuffing it full of crap about your life. When you have something really important to say that will mean something significant to me, then you can come tell me. Or call me. Or email me directly. You're not the damn Daily News. You're not so important that you need to broadcast your every thought and action to a legion of followers. You can have direct interactions with me. One on one. And if you can't, then whatever it is probably isn't that important in the first place. I have the decency not to bother with Facebook or Twitter. Why? Well, I am a writer. I'm also a bit of an entrepreneur. I also value other people's time and don't feel that every thought I have or action I take is worth sharing with the world. Inf act, I feel that very few are. And when I do have something of value to share, I'm not going to do it on Facebook or Twitter. I'll do it on a website, like we've done for fifteen years and it'll have more thought given to it than a 140 character spam of my new startup or a "so drunk lol!" followed by seventy-eight photos of me getting wasted at a bar, like a rookie.

savagejen 15y ago
Yes, you are so clearly concerned with every second of your life that you have time to write this comment.
ezy 15y ago
I mean this in the kindest possible way -- but you're a snob. :-) I was resistant to facebook at first, but I've found it a great way to keep in touch. Yes, sometimes people over-share, and sometimes there is a temptation to over-share yourself. But if you're an adult, it's easy to recognize that and make allowances for that in other people. It's part of the human social fabric. And it's quite useful to be able to post vacation photos (as one example), or blast out an update and have group comments -- it seems less isolating, and frankly less annoying, than group email updates when your friends are geographically separated. Do people "collect" friends? Yes... that can happen. But like anything else, you can use it like an adult, and play to it's advantages, rather than it's disadvantages. To some geeks, uninitiated social contact that doesn't make their own special needs primary is an annoyance. But -- trust me, the resulting anger and isolation isn't really worth the curmudgeon act. You are not that busy, you're are probably not solving world hunger, etc... lay off the snobbery. Now Twitter on the other hand, is a little different. Its nature is to be more of a public platform. Something public personalities use -- and in that case, the character limit makes something that should be deeper, much too shallow. I use it as a headline news ticker ('cause the existing RSS tickers are less capable than twitter clients), but don't bother following individuals.
- pstack 15y ago
  The thing is, the signal on a social network like Facebook is not strong enough to overcome the noise and it would require that I spend precious time parsing through a significant amount of that noise just to reach the few rare bits of signal. I'm not concerned about myself over-sharing, because I have at least some reasonable sense of "is anyone going to give a damn and will this be of any benefit to anyone whatsoever". I'm more concerned with he deluge of other people's mundane daily lives. I don't need to be a receptacle of their stream of consciousness and I don't need the chore of parsing through it for anything useful. I'm, frankly, a little offended that you are suggesting that snobbery is involved and that it has an element of "well, your commentary doesn't my my needs the priority, so it is therefore of no interest to me". That's hardly it, at all. It's more an issue of "I don't need to be bombarded with every trivial thought and action of your entire daily life and I would not bombard you with the same". News shock -- you are not that important and neither am I. And you don't need to post the constant stream of inanity to "keep in touch" -- assuming that you even need a third party utility to "keep in touch" (isn't that what email is for?). For example, I finally logged into my Facebook account while posting this and here were the most recent updates that greeted me. Note that the age of every poster here is between 25 and 50. No, I'm not solving world hunger, but am I a snob for saying that all of the below is a complete waste of my time and that the only reason a person would post any of these things is that they either have keyboard-turrettes or are some degree of attention whore? Do I have anything more significant to say with the same frequency of all these inane posts? Do I have anything truly earth shattering and mind-bending and enlightening that absolutely must be shared with a hundred people several times per day? No, I don't. So I don't post. I choose not to add to the noise that other people (presumably people that I am either close friends with or at least vaguely associated with) have to sift through. Interesting how that makes me a snob, rather than considerate. * Someone posted a picture of their cat. * Someone posted a picture of something really old in their freezer and asked if they should still eat it. * Someone made a snarky comment about Obama. * Several people posted links spamming projects they're doing (shows, events, etc). * Someone posted their tarot reading (again). * Someone said they should have been in bed an hour ago. * Someone answered questions in some app about how tall they are. * Someone said they saved a lot of money grocery shopping today. * Someone liked Dial brand soap. * Someone said the work day will never end. * Someone said they "love being a mommy". * Several people posted links to random stupid youtube videos. * Several more stupid updates from apps (no matter how many you click "hide" on, there are always more). * Someone said "that dream was different!" * Someone made some vague drama-infused comment about their relationship or a friendship or something (I couldn't tell which). * Someone said they can't wait for Friday. Another way of thinking of this. I call my mom maybe once a month and talk to her for half an hour or so. The woman who gave birth to me. The woman who raised me. The woman who sacrificed a lot in life to make sure that I was fortunate enough to become the person that I am today. I talk to her once a month-ish. Just long enough to catch up on the most important things and let her know she's important in our lives. I would not want a running stream of every action and thought my own mom made. Why on earth would I want one every hour or two from every single friend or associate I have. People overshare. Too much and too frequently. And too trivially. Whatever happened to going out and having a drink and shooting the shit with your friends? That's fine, every now and then. Keeping in touch when something big is fine. I don't, however, need to hear from you every damn hour on every damn thing going on. And they don't need to hear that from me, either. As I said, people absolutely adore talking about themselves. They are attention-whores. They want to broadcast as much inanity and/or drama as they possibly can to the largest audience they possibly can and it's usually a one-way-street (though even more so on Twitter). If they had even one second of consideration for the value of their contribution and the value of their "friends" time, they wouldn't post nearly as much of the crap that they do. And it's not just your buddy. Or the guy at work. Or the ex-girlfriend. Or the random dude you met at a convention that friended you when you got back home. It's the tech celebs. It's the tech industry darlings. It's Scoble and Kevin Rose and everyone else. Trust me, I've considered following the twitter feeds of some of these people. After all, they stumble on to some cool things and have some interesting thoughts to offer. But even with these people, the level of noise is just incredible. So much so that I stopped following any of them ages ago and don't bother to follow anyone anymore, because I know that for every interesting 140 characters I get from them, I'll have to pour through many thousands of characters of trivial crap (or even meaningless crap, when it's just semi-inside stuff between them and someone else). My time and attention isn't more valuable than anyone else's, but that doesn't mean that it should be wasted, either. It seems entirely reasonable to expect people to have at least a little bit of a filter on their output with respect for the dozens or hundreds or thousands of people that are going to be subjected to their signal (or more often, noise) before submitting. And yes, I realize the hypocrisy of my statement after I just sat here and wrote about a thousand pages. Sorry.
wikyd 15y ago
You write like everyone who posts to Facebook or Twitter expects you to read everything they post. I don't think anyone posts with that expectation in mind.
- pstack 15y ago
  I understand that isn't the case, but they obviously want as much attention for each update as possible or else they wouldn't bother and regardless of their expectations, it's still more stuff that every other person has to sift through.
  - wikyd 15y ago
    Well, I disagree that you have to sift through it. Normally, I am a "completionist" and don't want to miss anything, but I've come to accept that most content on social networks is transient and I couldn't read it all even if I tried. Even Facebook's "full" feed doesn't include everything. I think, though, that audience targeting is the weak point of Facebook and Twitter right now. I think many times people post something with a few people in mind or at least a subset of their social graph. For example, when I post technical articles that probably are interesting and relevant to my technical peers, my HS friends and family will see them also. I don't think you can blame users for doing this or chalk it up to vanity. Their posts are probably relevant and interesting, but just for a subset of their graph. A Googler made an interesting presentation describing this problem: http://www.slideshare.net/padday/the-real-life-social-network-v2 http://www.slideshare.net/padday/the-real-life-social-networ...
jradakov 15y ago
Perfect! Well put.

by pstack 15y ago

savagejen 15y ago

Yes, you are so clearly concerned with every second of your life that you have time to write this comment.

ezy 15y ago

I mean this in the kindest possible way -- but you're a snob. :-) I was resistant to facebook at first, but I've found it a great way to keep in touch. Yes, sometimes people over-share, and sometimes there is a temptation to over-share yourself. But if you're an adult, it's easy to recognize that and make allowances for that in other people. It's part of the human social fabric. And it's quite useful to be able to post vacation photos (as one example), or blast out an update and have group comments -- it seems less isolating, and frankly less annoying, than group email updates when your friends are geographically separated. Do people "collect" friends? Yes... that can happen. But like anything else, you can use it like an adult, and play to it's advantages, rather than it's disadvantages. To some geeks, uninitiated social contact that doesn't make their own special needs primary is an annoyance. But -- trust me, the resulting anger and isolation isn't really worth the curmudgeon act. You are not that busy, you're are probably not solving world hunger, etc... lay off the snobbery. Now Twitter on the other hand, is a little different. Its nature is to be more of a public platform. Something public personalities use -- and in that case, the character limit makes something that should be deeper, much too shallow. I use it as a headline news ticker ('cause the existing RSS tickers are less capable than twitter clients), but don't bother following individuals.

pstack 15y ago
The thing is, the signal on a social network like Facebook is not strong enough to overcome the noise and it would require that I spend precious time parsing through a significant amount of that noise just to reach the few rare bits of signal. I'm not concerned about myself over-sharing, because I have at least some reasonable sense of "is anyone going to give a damn and will this be of any benefit to anyone whatsoever". I'm more concerned with he deluge of other people's mundane daily lives. I don't need to be a receptacle of their stream of consciousness and I don't need the chore of parsing through it for anything useful. I'm, frankly, a little offended that you are suggesting that snobbery is involved and that it has an element of "well, your commentary doesn't my my needs the priority, so it is therefore of no interest to me". That's hardly it, at all. It's more an issue of "I don't need to be bombarded with every trivial thought and action of your entire daily life and I would not bombard you with the same". News shock -- you are not that important and neither am I. And you don't need to post the constant stream of inanity to "keep in touch" -- assuming that you even need a third party utility to "keep in touch" (isn't that what email is for?). For example, I finally logged into my Facebook account while posting this and here were the most recent updates that greeted me. Note that the age of every poster here is between 25 and 50. No, I'm not solving world hunger, but am I a snob for saying that all of the below is a complete waste of my time and that the only reason a person would post any of these things is that they either have keyboard-turrettes or are some degree of attention whore? Do I have anything more significant to say with the same frequency of all these inane posts? Do I have anything truly earth shattering and mind-bending and enlightening that absolutely must be shared with a hundred people several times per day? No, I don't. So I don't post. I choose not to add to the noise that other people (presumably people that I am either close friends with or at least vaguely associated with) have to sift through. Interesting how that makes me a snob, rather than considerate. * Someone posted a picture of their cat. * Someone posted a picture of something really old in their freezer and asked if they should still eat it. * Someone made a snarky comment about Obama. * Several people posted links spamming projects they're doing (shows, events, etc). * Someone posted their tarot reading (again). * Someone said they should have been in bed an hour ago. * Someone answered questions in some app about how tall they are. * Someone said they saved a lot of money grocery shopping today. * Someone liked Dial brand soap. * Someone said the work day will never end. * Someone said they "love being a mommy". * Several people posted links to random stupid youtube videos. * Several more stupid updates from apps (no matter how many you click "hide" on, there are always more). * Someone said "that dream was different!" * Someone made some vague drama-infused comment about their relationship or a friendship or something (I couldn't tell which). * Someone said they can't wait for Friday. Another way of thinking of this. I call my mom maybe once a month and talk to her for half an hour or so. The woman who gave birth to me. The woman who raised me. The woman who sacrificed a lot in life to make sure that I was fortunate enough to become the person that I am today. I talk to her once a month-ish. Just long enough to catch up on the most important things and let her know she's important in our lives. I would not want a running stream of every action and thought my own mom made. Why on earth would I want one every hour or two from every single friend or associate I have. People overshare. Too much and too frequently. And too trivially. Whatever happened to going out and having a drink and shooting the shit with your friends? That's fine, every now and then. Keeping in touch when something big is fine. I don't, however, need to hear from you every damn hour on every damn thing going on. And they don't need to hear that from me, either. As I said, people absolutely adore talking about themselves. They are attention-whores. They want to broadcast as much inanity and/or drama as they possibly can to the largest audience they possibly can and it's usually a one-way-street (though even more so on Twitter). If they had even one second of consideration for the value of their contribution and the value of their "friends" time, they wouldn't post nearly as much of the crap that they do. And it's not just your buddy. Or the guy at work. Or the ex-girlfriend. Or the random dude you met at a convention that friended you when you got back home. It's the tech celebs. It's the tech industry darlings. It's Scoble and Kevin Rose and everyone else. Trust me, I've considered following the twitter feeds of some of these people. After all, they stumble on to some cool things and have some interesting thoughts to offer. But even with these people, the level of noise is just incredible. So much so that I stopped following any of them ages ago and don't bother to follow anyone anymore, because I know that for every interesting 140 characters I get from them, I'll have to pour through many thousands of characters of trivial crap (or even meaningless crap, when it's just semi-inside stuff between them and someone else). My time and attention isn't more valuable than anyone else's, but that doesn't mean that it should be wasted, either. It seems entirely reasonable to expect people to have at least a little bit of a filter on their output with respect for the dozens or hundreds or thousands of people that are going to be subjected to their signal (or more often, noise) before submitting. And yes, I realize the hypocrisy of my statement after I just sat here and wrote about a thousand pages. Sorry.

wikyd 15y ago

You write like everyone who posts to Facebook or Twitter expects you to read everything they post. I don't think anyone posts with that expectation in mind.

pstack 15y ago
I understand that isn't the case, but they obviously want as much attention for each update as possible or else they wouldn't bother and regardless of their expectations, it's still more stuff that every other person has to sift through.
- wikyd 15y ago
  Well, I disagree that you have to sift through it. Normally, I am a "completionist" and don't want to miss anything, but I've come to accept that most content on social networks is transient and I couldn't read it all even if I tried. Even Facebook's "full" feed doesn't include everything. I think, though, that audience targeting is the weak point of Facebook and Twitter right now. I think many times people post something with a few people in mind or at least a subset of their social graph. For example, when I post technical articles that probably are interesting and relevant to my technical peers, my HS friends and family will see them also. I don't think you can blame users for doing this or chalk it up to vanity. Their posts are probably relevant and interesting, but just for a subset of their graph. A Googler made an interesting presentation describing this problem: http://www.slideshare.net/padday/the-real-life-social-network-v2 http://www.slideshare.net/padday/the-real-life-social-networ...

jradakov 15y ago

Perfect! Well put.