Like anything in life, technology offers so many choices. With the Web 2.0 thing in full swing, it’s almost overwhelming. There is social networking for everything.
Of course some folks choose to opt out of such things, citing time or privacy issues.
Myself, I like to opt-in to some of these things, but it can be difficult to know which options are best, in terms of having the most facilities or the easiest or most efficient means of use.
First thing, I must say, is that I really probably don’t NEED to do any of it. It’s an interest. There is a danger for some that it can become a compulsion. I, myself, don’t feel an overwhelming desire to post my every thought, every idea, every movement.
There are social sites for almost every aspect of our lives, from eating and drinking to watching movies, places visited, music listened to, even sites to share the more private moments.
In my opinion the #1 site for social networking has to be Facebook.
Why? Well, unlike MySpace, there is no need or indeed real ability to go on a pseudo-designing rampage, and create a bright purple site, with green twinkling stars, and red text in an 8 point font size that no can read with those stars behind. Ok, so not every MySpace page is that bad but Facebook concentrates much more on content. Also, MySpace is often slow, and the user interface is horrible.
There are now some 10,000 applications for Facebook, and with Microsoft having a stake in it, it’s probably going nowhere for some time. So, it hasn’t joined Google’s OpenSocial, but it does have all these apps anyway.
Some of these apps are, in opinion useful, and help enhance the social networking aspect of the site. For example, you can add Menuism.com to your profile, which allows you to review restaurants. This is truly useful, the more people use it, as you’re getting real reviews from someone like myself who will tell it warts and all, and not any kind of advertorial.
Other useful apps are Flixster, which allows you to review movies; iLike which can interface with Windows Media Player and/or iTunes; Zoho, which gives you an online office you can share, and iRead for book reviews.
There are many "fun" apps ranging for those allowing you to throw things at your "friends" to finding out what kind of Disney Princess you are. Yes well. Perhaps I’m a miserable old fart, but I don’t find those much use, but then you can simply ignore your friend requests when they invite you to join an app, so you don’t get bombarded with anything you don’t want.
Another cool use for Facebook is the ability to link your Flickr Album into your profile, or to add photographs to small albums in Facebook itself. You can also attach photos to your messages, and you can tag people that are on Facebook within your photos so a mouse-over tells others who is who.
Video is catered for, with an app you can add that totally integrates into the site. One click and you can send short video clips with sound right from your web cam. You can also upload and add videos you’ve made earlier, as well as offerings from YouTube.
There are various discussion groups within Facebook for serious and frivolous topics. For the most part, I have found the site to be safe for all the family to use.
Latest Comments