Social networking sites are like nightclubs?

[randomness]

marginaleye, referencing the MySpace to Facebook to Google+ trend: "I fear, however, the horrible possibility that social networking is going to be a perpetual treadmill of pursuing the 'in crowd' and fleeing prole drift, stretching out from here to infinity."

Well, it is how clubbing seems to go. Some dance clubs do last a while, but the crowd does seem to follow the trendiest new place. So there is some social precedent here.

I suppose if one was creating a social networking site one might keep that particular dynamic in mind.

Comments

[miss-chance.livejournal.com]

What perplexes me in this quote is why this is a "horrible possibility." It's socializing. Socialization has flow and change. What's the big deal? Why is is this bad in any way?

[marginaleye.livejournal.com]

It's a horrible possibility because it's a lot of work because re-creating one's online profile, re-connecting with everyone, learning the quirks in each new system, and shuffling everybody onto the correct side of one or more filtration mechanisms (Circles, Friends lists, and so forth) takes time and energy.

Socializing, moreover, isn't a happy self-sustaining, self-rewarding thing for introverts. It's work. You may know, intellectually, that it's important for one's mental heath and crucial to social success, but it's still... work. It's like eating nutritious vegetables whose taste you don't really like, or like dragging yourself to the gym even when you're not really in the mood for it.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

I'm glad marginaleye spoke up, because I really can't speak about his concerns, but I can talk about mine.

My problem with "social networking sites" isn't with the "social" or socializing part of the phrase, it's with the "networking site" part. I'd rather the flow and change wasn't in the application but in the socialization itself. All of the networking site overhead gets in the way of my actual socializing, and each additional networking site is more overhead.

And for what, really? To make yet another group of rich businessmen richer through my social network? Seems like a great deal for them.

All in all, I don't personally think it's horrible--I'm an extrovert, so this stuff comes easy--but I certainly find the proliferation of networking sites irritating, particularly as it's fairly clear that social networking sites are being rolled out because they're the IPO flavor of the year.

So I open accounts and park my name in them in order to make sure that people can reach me, set up forwarding to my email address, and then I wait to see if there's anything useful going on. Ever since Facebook I've been posting less and less in each new social networking site that opens. At some point I imagine the venture capitalists will move on to the next big thing.

I hope that's made my point of view a bit less perplexing.