Monthly Archive for November, 2007

It seems every time I meet a new acquaintance, the last thing they ask before parting ways is, “Do you have Facebook? You should add me!”

Now, I don’t know if this has officially replaced the more customary exchange of business cards but my stock response is usually, “Facebook? Eww!”

But as I call myself a technology journalist of sorts and have to attend a conference on social media this weekend, I’ve been forced into the world of online social networking.

The “Eww!” comment is usually meant to convey somehow being above the MySpace and Facebook fad but I’d like to think the truth is a little less shallow.

To understand my aversion to social media, we need to go back more than a decade. I was 12-years-old when I was first connected to the Internet. At that point, most people had heard of it but few had really experienced it. It was a realm of uber-geeks and porn addicts (I was the former, just to make things clear.)

To the general population, it was this strange and scary place, full of creepy nerds who rarely saw sunlight, bomb-making instructions and pornography.

But I saw more to it, limitless possibilities of connecting to all over the world via IRC, plenty of information available through web sites (which I had to find by searching with InfoSeek, Google didn’t exist yet.) To an extent, it was like my dirty little secret. My friends had no idea what I was doing when I said I was playing a MUD (Multi-User Dungeon, online text RPGs which were probably the precursor to World of Warcraft.)

Facebook and to a lesser extent, MySpace are like the tipping point to me. I don’t remember the last time I rode a bus and didn’t hear someone making reference to Facebook, it’s that ubiquitous. And…it’s weird to me. The same people who stuffed me a locker for being such a geek in high school now have online profiles with dozens of friends in their networks. Um, aren’t you guys who beat me up being into that stuff ten years ago?

All that said, progress is good. With more acceptance of the online world, I’m able to business with people on the other side of the world. I’m able to work out of a coffee shop and nobody thinks it’s weird anymore. In fact, telecommuting seems to be one the ways business is going and I do think that’s great.

But still, some days I feel like the indie kid whose mad that the Arcade Fire is being played on mainstream FM radio stations when he remembers listening to them as college radio darlings.