Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Face the Music
OK, I'm on Facebook now. Satisfied?
I'm sorry, that was a bit abrupt, wasn't it. It's just that I was a hold-out against it for a long time.
Friends have been urging me to join for awhile, but these are the same friends who convinced me to start blogging and look where that's led.
Also, I'd tried social networks before and disliked them. Specifically, I signed up to Myspace just so I could see my blogger friends' pages, but I never really "got" Myspace. It all seemed very confusing, jumbled and generally unpleasant to deal with.
On the surface, Facebook is little different from Myspace. Yet, somehow the whole community seems to convey a more pleasant atmosphere. I can't quite put my finger on the difference.
But it is totally addictive. I've been on for a day and I'm utterly hooked.
...Which is scary, in a way. I still prefer blogging. For one thing, I'm a writer and an opinionated bastard, and blogging gives me an opportunity to practice both. Social networking doesn't seem to take much creativity or thought.
But it sure does explain a few things. I've noticed over the past few months a sharp drop off in blogging activity out there in my usual circles. Generating comments seems much, much harder than it used to be. Many of the people who got me into blogging in the first place have long since dropped off the map. Sure enough, all of the usual suspects are now at it hot and heavy in Facebook land. Once again, I feel like the last one to show up at the orgy!
Now, usually I'm a crazy partisan about such things. I stuck with Beta video until the bitter end, for chrissakes. Computer salesmen back in the day had a hard time convincing me that the Amiga did not have a future.
I'd like to think I've learned from those mistakes. So, while Blogger is clearly superior, it looks like I'm now also going to have to invest some time at Facebook.
I hope to see you all there, but please please PLEASE don't neglect this page. Automated email hugs may be all nicey-nicey, but this will still always be the place you get the primo Mentok material.
posted by Mentok @ 10:27 a.m.,
3 Comments:
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At 7:29 p.m.,
cchang said...
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Nope! Won't neglect this page...although with the Notes function, you can import all your blogger posts. I think the nicety with Facebook is that there's no spamming and the interface is cleaner. I dunno. I'm addicted to!
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At 7:59 p.m.,
said...
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so is that where fil is all the time? playing scrabble and whatnot on facebook? he says it's a lot of fun, but i haven't had a chance to check it out yet. the scrabble that is. i do have a facebook page, but i don't really understand how to use it. i don't really understand social networking, to be honest. i guess i'm old school. ha!
i use myspace these days mainly for bands. no one (well, hardly anyone) my age has a myspace page. -
At 10:45 p.m.,
FiL said...
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Here I am, Dearest Marcy!!
I agree 100% with you, Dearest Mentok, that Facebook is a far more versatile, connective, and friendly social network than myspace. I mean, look how much fun we've had already bombing each other. But I don't see Facebook as a blogging substitute - more as a complement.
I too have noticed that the blogosphere has quietened down. Part of it is, I think, summer doldrums. Part of it is some sort of trough in the weird circadian rhythm of the blog. Part of it is natural wasteage. Part of it is folks having scads to do at work due to to those f-ing Yankee bankers and their goddamn subprime mortgages - oops, sorry, that'd be me.
But all of this is also a healthy reminder about the impermanence of things...
