What is Facebook for? Here is my take (or, Verani doesn't care about Scoble's personal life)

Facebook, as my readers know, is one of the most popular social-oriented websites ever. However, there has been a lot of controversy over how it should be used.

There seem to be two schools of thought. The first is that Facebook is a great way to connect with people you already know, to organize events with friends; it is rather like Email's more successful cousin.

The other school of thought is that Facebook is a new kind of Internet rolodex. These people add anyone and everyone as a friend. That way they can keep in contact with many people they don't know, but maybe wish they did. Of course, if this is the case, on the other end are the celebrities, who have thousands of friends who wish they knew them, like Robert Scoble of Scobleizer.com.

When I first decided to see what all the Facebook buzz was about, I fell in with the "rolodex crowd". I made the mistake of using my identity as a blogger, and adding other bloggers and technology people whom I didn't know personally, but greatly admired. So, I had Robert Scoble, Mike Arrington, Jason Calacanis, Sridhar Vembu, &c. on my friends list, but no one whom I actually knew in real life. I was able to keep tabs on the numerous events, product releases, &c. from these people, but nothing personal. Maybe I should rephrase that. I was able to keep up on their personal lives, but I frankly don't give a care about Scoble's personal life, because he is not someone whom I know personally.

When I am friends with someone whom I don't know in real life on Facebook, it makes me feel like an eavesdropper, or a peeping Tom. At that point, all Facebook helped me with was networking, and that is not really the point of it. If I were interested in that, I would have looked at something like LinkedIn.

Facebook began to bore me to death, so I stopped using it (my account is still there, but I don't use it). Then, I noticed that one of my real friends was using it. So, I decided to open up a new account (I know, against the Terms of Use, don't tell anyone...) in my real identity, the ones that my real friends know. I added all the people I personally know, joined my school network, joined my city network, and then started experimenting with various applications and stuff.

I have found that most applications are annoying. The stupidest things are apps that let you "Throw a cow at so-and-so", &c. So, I only use a few apps that actually help me to network with my friends. I find that the most important thing about Facebook is the wall. I use it to communicate back and forth with my friends more than Email. I find that I only use email now to communicate with friends who are not using Facebook, my parents, and various companies.

Now that I use Facebook to augment my relationships with existing friends and not to make new friends (I do that in the real world, not online), I find myself visiting it more and more often, and actually updating my status often.

Another thing Facebook has done for me is help me get into contact with old friends. Several years ago, I moved out of town and lost a dear friend in the process. His email and phone numbers have changed more than once since we last saw each other, and I have had no way of communicating with him. Then, I thought to look for him on Facebook, and of course, he was there. Now, we have been able to communicate for the first time since the year 2001.

If you use it how it was meant to be, Facebook doesn't have to be part of the Narcissystem.

What is Twitter? A bloody waste of time!, or one man's dramatic divorce of the narcissystem

I tried to get into Twitter. I was even enthusiastic. I used it for a while, and even made some 'social connections'. But now, I realise that it is an entire waste of time.

What can Twitter do for me? Nothing but keep me from my work, and stop me from going to bed when I ought. Because of things like Twitter, I have done less important things. Therefore, starting today, I am done with Twitter, Jaiku, or any other kinds of narcissystematical crap (too bad I am not as famous as Leo Laporte, because it could be a double whammy: I am not only quitting Twitter, but Jaiku and loads of other useless crap).

So, goodbye Twitter friends, for I doubt I shall ever meet you again, in the narcissystem.

[just in case this is just a passing rant, wait a few days before you stop following me... :) ]

Ustream, Istream, WeAll Stream, or, ScobleCam: our final fall into narcissystem-atical insanity

That's right folks, we have finally reached the pinnacle of human insanity, exhibitionism, and voyeurism. A while ago (to be more exact, 27 days, nine hours, and 38 minutes ago), some guy named Justin started to broadcast his life over the internet through a webcam. Ever since, for every single minute and second in the day, there has been a webcam that people can watch through the internet.

What does this mean? Why on earth is this enjoyable to people? The only thing I can think of that would explain why people are watching someone's life through a webcam is that they are unsatisfied with the lives that they lea. They decide since they 'have no chance to make a difference', they will just watch someone else 'not making a difference'. This is insane.

I would say that it is narcissm (see Scoble's post, Nothing more boring than the "narcissystem") on the part of Justin and the like, thinking that people actually would want to watch his every movement, but he is right! So many people actually do want to watch his life, wasting away their own. This is insane.

Yesterday, Robert Scoble posted an article called ScobleCam coming?. In it, he introduced his testing of his own ScobleCam, which broadcasted for more than three hours. I believe that this trend could have been something that would just die off, because the majority of internet users (I hope) are smarter than to unproductively watch someone driving around in a car for hours. But Robert Scoble, possibly the foremost internet tech blogger, is in it, and that changes everything. Things like Ustream die, but not if they have extremely important people talking about them.

What is different about this and Twitter? Isn't this just a bigger, better, more visual version of Twitter? No. While this performs the basic purpose of Twitter (what am I doing, where am I doing it, etc.), this is pure evil, and Twitter isn't. Period. While with Twitter you can quickly scan through peoples tweets, and by having quick, 140char conversations, you can make a social connection, with things like Ustream (the site that hosts Scoble's cam), you sit there for a long time, waiting for something to happen. Just watching. Waisting time. For instance, if I were into watching these weird whatever.tv things, I would not have time to be blogging, or reading my feeds. This would cause me to be unproductive, and uninformed. Do we really need more unproductive, uninformed people?

What makes watching other people bad? If we feel the need to watch someone else's life unfold before us, we must have some sort of psychological problem. We must feel that we don't have an interesting enough life, so we resort to envying someone else's, and watching it. All day. This is just like all those really bad reality shows on Television, except they really are reality. Just wait, I bet there will be some commercial ones, where there is an actor playing the person on screen ($$$ADS$$$MONETISATION$$$$$).

What is so bad about broadcasting your own life? Of course, it is your decision. But by broadcasting your own life, 24-7, I think that you have to have some sort of psychological problem. The condition that people who watch your life have is called voyeurism, and the problem of people who broadcast their lives is called exhibitionism. Not only does this demonstrate the existance of a psychological problem, but it also could create a psychological problem. Having that many people watching you must feel like eyes, everywhere. I wouldn't be surprised if this got popular, and we had an entire generation of schizophrenic youth. Being watched, you have to be careful about what you do, say, how you say it, who you are with, etc. It brings a whole new world of pressure into what once was reality.

So, readers, join me in not jumping into the pit of narcissystematical insanity.