3 ms·

You tried camping and it was awesome. It was fun getting a group together and having a lot of interaction with them. Working on projects together, sharing gossi

You tried camping and it was awesome. It was fun getting a group together and having a lot of interaction with them. Working on projects together, sharing gossip at meals and in tents, going on day trips and coming back with pictures and stories. Great stuff. People who spend time camping together share a bond and become potential lifelong friends. When camping was new, relatively few people went camping. The most exciting, adventurous and challenging way to camp is, of course, to bring your own food and gear and rough it, just you and nature. Some businesses saw an opportunity to introduce a lot more people to camping and make some money. They'd build some cabins around a lake and do some marketing. It's not the same, but most people weren't going to rough it in the woods anyway, right? A Harvard kid announced a new camp one day for other Harvard kids. Everyone who was anyone started going to Mark's camp. If you knew people going to this camp, and you wanted to really connect with them, you had to go to Mark's camp to do it. Sure, there were other ways to connect with them, but Mark's camp is where people are spending a lot of their time and Mark's campfire is where they share their stories. In fact, over a tenth the population of planet Earth has made Mark's camp their hangout. You still love camping as much as you ever did, and you want to connect and share stuff with all your family and friends. But it really grates on you that you have to walk through Mark's gate and live by Mark's rules in order to do that. Isn't there some way you could round up a crew, leave Mark's camp behind, and strike out into the wild somewhere, just you and your friends, to do some real camping?

charlieok 15y ago
p.s. If the parent comment resonated with you, you might like this presentation: http://www.infoq.com/presentations/A-P2P-Digital-Self-with-TeleHash http://www.infoq.com/presentations/A-P2P-Digital-Self-with-T...
- noduerme 15y ago
  That resonated like hitting a 40' bong. I remember ... X person used to say about Y, in my family... "Why the hell would anyone wanna live under his roof, and live by his rules? Even if they had to sleep on the street it'd be better". I reckon it's about the same for self-respecting men living with Zuckerberg.
  - ktizo 15y ago
    By his own words, if you use trust him with your data you are a dumb fuck. I am willing to take him at his word on that one and not use his service. (must extricate myself from google, somehow. not feeling that smug, really.) [edit] and at least he was honest about it. In some ways, that makes me trust him more than google.
aasarava 15y ago
If camping is a metaphor for social interaction, then wouldn't picking up the phone, or writing a letter, or sending an email, or a text, or driving over to your friends' houses and saying, "Hey, let's go to a coffee shop" be the real camping you're looking for? You're setting up a zero sum analogy, assuming that everyone is so busy on Facebook that they no longer interact or share photos/jokes/memes in other ways. Not sure that's really the case.
- bmelton 15y ago
  Wouldn't all those other interactions equate to all the time you aren't camping?
- alanh 15y ago
  There are events, parties, groups, and meet-ups which are exclusively organized on Facebook. But we can fight back. Quoting Dave Winer: > BTW, I get invited to events that say check out the Facebook page for details about where to be and when. If I care about the event, I write back to them telling them I don't use Facebook, and would read about it if they put up a blog post. Otherwise I can't come. If people hear that a few times, it'll start changing behavior. It's not the kind of thing you need a lot of people to do to force change. It's kind of like Apple refusing to put Flash on their iPhone and iPad. I don't imagine too many events would get reconceived just for me, but if a few more people do it, that could be enough to make the change.
bfrs 15y ago
I don't mind going to Mark's camp, but its huge size sometimes frightens me. What if a black swan event happens to it? Say a stupid virus penetrates and wipes it out? A more distributed social network, like the failed Diaspora project, might be less vulnerable to such an attack. stupid in this sense: http://www.searchlores.org/realicra/basiclawsofhumanstupidity.htm http://www.searchlores.org/realicra/basiclawsofhumanstupidit...
readme 15y ago
I suspect most people, if they left the camp of Facebook, would not be able to round up as many "friends" by the campfire on their own, and that is why they stay. The culture of Facebook is not very exclusive. Many people will add you even if they have never spoken to you, simply because they knew who you were and would like to increase the size of their network. Excellent way to lull people into a false sense of community.

charlieok 15y ago

p.s. If the parent comment resonated with you, you might like this presentation: http://www.infoq.com/presentations/A-P2P-Digital-Self-with-TeleHash http://www.infoq.com/presentations/A-P2P-Digital-Self-with-T...

noduerme 15y ago
That resonated like hitting a 40' bong. I remember ... X person used to say about Y, in my family... "Why the hell would anyone wanna live under his roof, and live by his rules? Even if they had to sleep on the street it'd be better". I reckon it's about the same for self-respecting men living with Zuckerberg.
- ktizo 15y ago
  By his own words, if you use trust him with your data you are a dumb fuck. I am willing to take him at his word on that one and not use his service. (must extricate myself from google, somehow. not feeling that smug, really.) [edit] and at least he was honest about it. In some ways, that makes me trust him more than google.

aasarava 15y ago

If camping is a metaphor for social interaction, then wouldn't picking up the phone, or writing a letter, or sending an email, or a text, or driving over to your friends' houses and saying, "Hey, let's go to a coffee shop" be the real camping you're looking for? You're setting up a zero sum analogy, assuming that everyone is so busy on Facebook that they no longer interact or share photos/jokes/memes in other ways. Not sure that's really the case.

bmelton 15y ago
Wouldn't all those other interactions equate to all the time you aren't camping?
alanh 15y ago
There are events, parties, groups, and meet-ups which are exclusively organized on Facebook. But we can fight back. Quoting Dave Winer: > BTW, I get invited to events that say check out the Facebook page for details about where to be and when. If I care about the event, I write back to them telling them I don't use Facebook, and would read about it if they put up a blog post. Otherwise I can't come. If people hear that a few times, it'll start changing behavior. It's not the kind of thing you need a lot of people to do to force change. It's kind of like Apple refusing to put Flash on their iPhone and iPad. I don't imagine too many events would get reconceived just for me, but if a few more people do it, that could be enough to make the change.

bfrs 15y ago

I don't mind going to Mark's camp, but its huge size sometimes frightens me. What if a black swan event happens to it? Say a stupid virus penetrates and wipes it out? A more distributed social network, like the failed Diaspora project, might be less vulnerable to such an attack. stupid in this sense: http://www.searchlores.org/realicra/basiclawsofhumanstupidity.htm http://www.searchlores.org/realicra/basiclawsofhumanstupidit...

readme 15y ago

I suspect most people, if they left the camp of Facebook, would not be able to round up as many "friends" by the campfire on their own, and that is why they stay. The culture of Facebook is not very exclusive. Many people will add you even if they have never spoken to you, simply because they knew who you were and would like to increase the size of their network. Excellent way to lull people into a false sense of community.