Tag Archives: Social networks

Some thoughts on the crowded field of social networks…

Posted on April 11, 2012 | Leave a comment

Brief aside: I see Google+ is rolling out a new look today. It might be a good time to check out the network, if you haven’t already. I’m on Google+ here and I follow a lot of interesting people.

I think it’s a false proposition to look for one clear winner among the big-player social networks, the one network that will destroy all the others. Yet this is what many tech and social media bloggers persist in trying to do, as if the social web were a horse race that at some point will clearly be over, instead of a place that is constantly evolving and growing.

There is room for many kinds of networks on the social web because the primary job of these networks is to connect people, and there are many types of people. No one network can be all things to all people, nor should it try to be. For instance, Google+ seems to appeal more to introverted types (like me; full disclosure), while Facebook attracts more extroverts. Pinterest is geared toward people who think visually; Twitter is for those who prefer a rapid-fire flow of information.

Not only do different types of networks work better for different types of people, but no one of us fits into a neatly labeled box all of the time. That’s why many of us like to move between networks as our needs dictate, even though we may have one primary place where we hang out most of the time. I definitely prefer Google+ for most sharing, but Twitter is a good place to exchange links or read breaking news, and on Facebook, I can keep up with an extended circle of friends and family.

So I don’t see much point in the endless articles dissecting why Google+ has so many followers as compared to Facebook, or what people think of Twitter or Pinterest. In this space, there is room for multiple winners. Still, blogs don’t seem to be going away anytime soon, and blogs must be filled with content, so I’m sure we’ll continue to be inundated with these meaningless pieces pitting the social networks against one another or lauding the latest newcomer as the giant killer.

As long as a network has a strong idea of its own identity and remembers who its primary user base is — and doesn’t stray too far afield of that by trying to be all possible things to all possible users — it can probably survive and even thrive in this crowded space. Until the social web is supplanted by something utterly new and unpredictable, that is.

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Posted in Geeking Out

Tagged Bloggers, Facebook, Google, Pinterest, Social media, Social networks, Social web, Thoughts, Twitter

Tips for managing your Google+ stream…

Posted on December 15, 2011 | Leave a comment

Over the past few months, I have moved most of my social networking from Twitter to Google+. I like the longer, more graphical posts provided by the Google+ format, and while people are sharing a lot of links, they are also writing extended commentary on those links that the Twitter character limit doesn’t allow. Because the comments are right underneath the post, it is also possible to have extended conversations about a post. But Google+ doesn’t seem to have the detritus, the meaningless conversations or the commercial flotsam of Facebook (at least not yet). You can follow me on Google+ here.

However, as more people have joined the network, I have noticed how much harder it is to keep up with all the content flowing in. You can add people to circles divided by subjects of interest, but all that content is still pumped into your main stream. If you follow any particularly prolific posters, it can soon become overwhelming.

That’s why I was glad I discovered the Plus Minus extension for Google Chrome. This handy tool lets me control via simple checkboxes which circles contribute content to my main stream. Whenever I log onto Google+, only the posts that come from the people who are most important to me show up on the main page. Another useful tool provided by Plus Minus is the ability to “shrink” posts, so that I can hide what I’ve already read or what I’m not interested in just by clicking an arrow.

Now that I can control the firehose of posts going into my main stream, I found that it was also necessary to control my reading. Otherwise, I’d browse Google+ all day and never do anything else. I created circles around my primary interests, such as news, geeky stuff, cooking, politics and books. I assigned each circle a day of the week, and on that day, I only pick posts from its corresponding circle to read. This helps me focus on the reading rather than feeling like I have to wade through an ocean of content.

As for posting, I try to post one or two public items per day so that potential followers know what kind of content I’m sharing. For the rest, I try to confine posting to that circle of interest. Personal posts typically are limited to friends and family. This takes advantage of Google+’s most powerful feature: circles. If you are in my Geeks circle, you’ll only see my science and tech posts; you won’t be bothered by cooking or political content. Of course, many people occupy multiple circles. Fortunately, when I shrink a post in one circle using the Plus Minus extension, it stays closed across all circles, so I don’t see it multiple times.

With Plus Minus, Google+ has become more fun and more manageable. I definitely prefer the content I’m seeing there to what can be found on Twitter, which isn’t meaty enough, or Facebook, which usually isn’t relevant to me. Of course, if I still want to share on other networks, there is a service for that: Plusist. It automates posting of public Google+ items to either Facebook or Twitter, or both.

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Posted in Geeking Out

Tagged Facebook, Google, Google Chrome, Social networks, Tools, Twitter

Too much information?

Posted on November 11, 2011 | Leave a comment

Image via Wikipedia

There is no doubt about it — we are living in an information Golden Age. In just a matter of minutes, and assuming my computer and Internet connection are working, I can find the top news stories of the day, plus analysis and commentary; I can research almost any question I have; I can read opinions on pretty much any subject; I can watch videos, view art and listen to music, all with a click.

But is it all too much for us to cope with? I’m reading a fascinating book about the history of science: Coming of Age in the Milky Way by Timothy Ferris. He describes how the invention of the printing press put books that were once extremely difficult to obtain into nearly every university, library and even some homes. Just as importantly, the accuracy and consistency of those books became much more reliable because they were no longer copied out by hand. As a result, science experienced a boom time, because scientists could finally easily read, study and build on each other’s ideas and data.

The development of the Internet, I think, will carry us into another boom time, if it hasn’t already begun. Not since the invention of the printing press has it been so easy to share information and build on what we already know. I don’t think it’s possible to have too much information. Information inevitably leads to innovation and progress. (That’s why it is so often suppressed.)

Image via Wikipedia

However, we have to change our habits when it comes to dealing with this unending flow of information, just as readers and publishers had to in the Renaissance following the invention of the printing press. It is no longer sufficient to be a passive receiver, even if you are not a scientist, but are a mere consumer of information. And content producers can no longer be one-way broadcasters of mass media, pushing content out to the lowest common denominator.

Rather, we must cultivate our sense of discernment, our ability to analyze, our critical thinking skills. We must be more willing to challenge what we read, see and hear on the Internet. We also must actively cull our incoming information flow, constantly editing our content stream so that it best serves our needs. I didn’t learn these skills in school; I don’t think many of my generation did. But they may (and should) be taught to my son.

I have had to learn for myself how to direct the fire hose of information. I have found this challenging and exciting, especially as I have watched the rise of social networks and seen how others engage in commentary and sharing. We are all helping one another to learn. We no longer rely on experts; each one of us can be consumer, publisher, analyst and critic of information.

My son is only three years old, but already I can see that he is unwilling to act as a passive receiver of information. Television cannot hold his attention when the computer beckons. What has been a challenging learning experience for me will probably be second nature to him.

I think it’s a waste of time to wonder if there is too much information available to us today. There is clearly no such thing as “too much information.” Human beings thrive on information, and if our species can be said to have a common purpose, it has been to increase our knowledge, to explore and discover. We will figure out how to better use these tools that we’ve invented. Our ability to adapt is one of our strengths, after all. But best of all, we will progress. With all of this information at our disposal, I don’t think we’ll be able to help it.

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Posted in Notebook

Tagged Critical thinking, History, Information, Information flow, Internet, Printing press, Renaissance, Social networks, Timothy Ferris

Should you expect privacy from online services?

Posted on February 13, 2010 | 4 Comments

I think the answer is no, with some qualifications, which I’ll get to shortly. But here’s the thing. When you sign up for free services like Google‘s various offerings, Twitter, Facebook, free blogging platforms and a myriad of other services online, your value to those companies is in the data and content you produce. It is not in their interest to keep that data private. If privacy is important to you, then it is up to you — and only you — to safeguard it.

The only way you can guarantee online privacy is to avoid free services, including all social networks, altogether. But you need an email account, for instance. Well, there are many alternatives to the free email services. Your ISP, who you are paying to provide Internet service to you, will probably give you one. Or you can pay for an email account with a hosting company. The point is, when you pay for a service, then you have a right to expect a higher level of privacy, as agreed upon between you and the company. (Many people use a free email account for public transactions, like online purchases, and keep a private email account for, well, private communications.)

If you do decide to get a free email account or sign up with a social network, then you should accept right off the bat that you will be giving up some privacy. That is the deal with the devil you make in exchange for free access to these networks. You will no longer have total control over information about you and that you generate. It is best to know this and accept this from the start.

Personally, I like the openness that social networks have brought. I think it fosters communication, collaboration, sharing and understanding of our differences, but that is the idealist in me. Yes, there is a negative side, but that is true of anything with value. I think social networks help us express who we are, and feel okay with who we are.

But if you are going to use these services, and privacy is of some importance to you, then you need to become savvy about how they work. When you sign up for a service, you need to be willing to explore, play with settings, try things and see what happens, and learn what the service is doing and why. This means extra work, but as I said, it is not in these companies’ interest to protect your privacy, so you can’t expect it of them. It only took me five minutes of playing with Google Buzz to figure out that my followers were listed on my public profile and to turn that off. That was well before all the privacy warnings came out.

I have some sympathy for people whose email contacts were exposed by Buzz, because this was not an expected outcome. But only to a point. Because you had to participate in that exposure. You had to set up a free Gmail account. You had to turn on Buzz. You had to create a public Google Profile. You had to accept the list of followers/following presented to you by Buzz without making any changes to remove those who were not acceptable to you. At each point, you could stop and ask yourself what the privacy implications of this are. At the very least, you could wait a few days for the issues to surface. It was only a few hours before many news outlets on the web were posting about Buzz’s privacy issues and the fixes for them.

I think this is a good learning moment for all of us. By all means, play in the social networking playground. But remember that these free services still have a cost. Just like in the real world, online the only one you can count on to take care of yourself is you.

Google’s response to the privacy concerns and instructions for protecting your privacy when using Buzz. And Google may offer Buzz independently from Gmail.

Critics Say Google Invades Privacy With New Service (nytimes.com)
Are contacts friends? Google tweaks social hub Buzz over privacy concerns (taragana.com)
Facebook CEO Zuckerberg causes stir over privacy (macworld.com)

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Posted in Geeking Out

Tagged Buzz, Facebook, Google Buzz, Online services, Privacy, Social networks, Technology

Is social networking learning?

Posted on February 21, 2009 | 2 Comments

: Image by luc legay via Flickr

A colleague of mine recently asked this question, which sparked an interesting discussion on our Yammer network: Is social networking learning? Especially in the context of organizations, how can social networking be used for learning?

I certainly use social networking tools like Twitter and blogs for informal, personal learning every day. What I like most about using social networking tools this way is how serendipitous it can be. Sure, I can ask questions or search for knowledge on a subject I know I want to learn about, but more often, it seems, I learn things I didn’t know I needed to learn. This happens when people in my network share what they are learning or thinking about or reading or writing about. That, for me, is where the real learning potential of social networking tools kicks in. I don’t think you can reproduce that quality with formal learning tools, because it is so ephemeral and unplanned.

Here are some other good points made in the conversation:

“I learn far more about what’s news and relevant to my work from my ‘network of trust and interest’ than I do from common denominator mass media.”
“Between spontaneous learning and network-of-trust filtering, you get a new level of just-in-time (JIT) learning: ‘before I knew I needed it’ learning.”
“Not everyone is going to succeed using social learning. Many of those that can already use it. Some of the rest just need permission. But if you aren’t really interested in your work, if you don’t think it is cool, how much is unstructured, social learning going to work for you. “

Someone also made this point: “There seems to be a tension … among the openness of informal learning, risk management and message control.” I think that tension is always there when there is also fear over loss of control. I have found, though, that in successful learning networks, people tend to police themselves. The organization must let go and trust its people, or people just won’t use the network sanctioned by the organization. If they are really passionate about learning and connecting with peers, they will find ways to do so outside of the organization’s control and without the organization’s blessing. So why not extend that trust and see what happens? The organization can only benefit from engaged employees actively learning about their fields.

We are just sharing already (shannonturlington.com)
How relevant are communities of practice in a network age? (socialmediatoday.com)
Listservs vs Twitter: Are You Ready to Make the Step into a Brief New World? (managemypractice.com)

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Posted in Notebook

Tagged Communities, Learning, Social networks, Twitter

Tag Archives: Social networks

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I Tweet, Therefore I Am (New York Times)
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