Seeing as I never did anything with MySpace (or Twitter, or Orkut, or Friendster….) I wonder if the fact that Facebook works for me and my undergrad pals says something about us:
The research suggests those using Facebook come from wealthier homes and are more likely to attend college. By contrast, MySpace users tend to get a job after finishing high school rather than continue their education.
What to make of that? I don’t know why there is so much buy-in from the people I know but it is as accessible as email in many ways keeping the participation threshold down. The lack of skins or visual personalization works in its favour as well. But the communal scrapbook thing is what I think works very well. Obsessing over who is that person in a photo from 23 years ago and tagging the separate people within them creates a pattern of continuity that expresses your own time line as well as branches out to do the same for people you know. So the illusion of a community gets some backing up compared to the post and reply of blogs or the thoughts of the day. It is a different thing to claim, having an actual mutual past – as opposed to a supposed present interest.
{Original comments…]
gary – June 26, 2007 9:00 AM
I am using facebook to stalk gorthos. I asked his wife to be my friend. I join all the strange groups he joins. I don’t think he’s noticed yet. He still owes me for that hippo toothbrush holder, the worm.
Alan – June 26, 2007 9:01 AM
Get him!
David Janes – June 26, 2007 10:02 AM
http://blog.davidjanes.com
There’s less to this than meets the eye. Until October of last year, Facebook only let people at colleges & universities join which skewed the demographic in a particular direction [i.e. thus explaining the high college attendance rate!]. As time passes, we’ll see Facebook trend toward the norm (so to speak) of the English speaking Internet population.
Alan – June 26, 2007 10:54 AM
Why is that less? I think there is also a particular success in the toll that has to be admitted.
cm – June 26, 2007 11:01 AM
Not to mention the fact that Satan, apparently, hangs out at myspace.
David Janes – June 26, 2007 11:26 AM
http://blog.davidjanes.com
“Less”, because it’s like saying members of The Redheaded League have more redheads and freckled-faces than the social club down the road.
Alan – June 26, 2007 11:37 AM
That is just a post hoc argument. I think you are missing something, David. There is a cultural reason that Orkut works in Brazil and no where else. There is a reason that people like MySpace over Facebook and vice versa.
Chris Taylor – June 26, 2007 11:52 AM
http://taylor.typepad.com
Orkut was originally rather whitebread “North American” several years ago. Wanda used to be on it way back when. Some other friends joined up and they used to be on there all the time, a la Facebook, until everyone started getting enormous amounts of Portuguese “Join my Orkut group” spam (aimed at Brazilians, obviously). Eventually all the English-speakers I know got fed up of daily foreign-language spam from people they did not know, and bailed out.
I don’t like Facebook or Myspace. Facebook was an easy way to catch up with people I haven’t seen in 10-15 years, but now that I have their e-mail address or phone number, it’s much easier to just call them up and say “let’s go to the pub”. Checking out the old photos was fun, but it’s old news to me now. There is only so much nostalgia I can handle before I want to slap people silly and holler “Get ON with your LIVES, already”. Now I’m content to basically never log on unless I get an SMS alert that someone’s e-mailed me there.
Alan – June 26, 2007 12:04 PM
My crowd is spread out over the country and has an unending facination in the trivial. Finding a Facebook group dedicated to the Mighty Hercules cartoons was a real breakthrough.
David Janes – June 26, 2007 12:20 PM
http://blog.davidjanes.com
It is not a post hoc argument Al — “B” follows “A” is doesn’t imply that “B” is created by “A”; it doesn’t imply anything, in and of itself.
However, can we not agree that if “A” creates “B” then “B” follows “A”?
To follow this further, in fact the authors of this study (and yourself, apparently) are making this exact logic error: “a greater percentage of Facebook users are university students than on MySpace” therefore “university students prefer Facebook to MySpace”.
You can’t make logical inferences of this sort without studying the actual underlying reasons or mechanics of people’s choices. In this case, the fact is that 7 months ago _100%_ of Facebook users were college students. If this study came out then, would you be still be impressed with the author’s conclusions?
Alan – June 26, 2007 12:42 PM
Of course it is a post hoc argument. You are saying that the success of Facebook is due to its focus in the way that the presence of the redheads at the club is due to the fact that it is a red heads club. It is post hoc because the club was founded for a purpose as is proven by its population therefore the Facebook’s success must be also due to its founding purpose. The post-ness is the success and the dependent hoc is the population of each group. But unlike the redheads club, the population of facebook is independent of its purpose now that it has been unleashed on the general population. You have not proven the analogy therefore it is a weak post hoc.
All of which is very tangential but I am willing to spar so go for it. I do think that Facebook is actually doing something differently and not just preaching to a choir – though I do not know what exactly.
David Janes – June 26, 2007 12:58 PM
http://blog.davidjanes.com
Now you’ve just invented stuff and claimed I’ve said it. I said nothing about the success of Facebook (in this arguement). I said the university statistic was uninteresting because seven months ago it was all university students _and_ I made a prediction that the university skew would disappear relative to a norm population over time.
Nor would I argue that having a university skewed population is “success”, because success in the Internet world cannot be defined outside the context of a metric or purpose.
However, I can see why we’re arguing past each other here (I think), as you see the first paragraph of your post the key one, whereas I identified the second one as such.
gary – June 26, 2007 1:07 PM
Wonder where gorthos is?
cm – June 26, 2007 1:47 PM
His new boss doesn’t approve of surfing on company time.
Alan – June 26, 2007 2:22 PM
David, then you have to admit your illustration used to forward your argument is an entire failure and you need to replace it with another analogy as I honestly tried to describe what you were talking about. No need to engage in fisticuffs.
David Janes – June 26, 2007 3:27 PM
http://blog.davidjanes.com
It’s like I’m in some parallel universe, where you are seeing something entirely different that what is here. We need an official judge. Where’s John Gushue these days?
Alan – June 26, 2007 3:37 PM
But that is not how communication works. Even if it is me, you need to make your point in a way that I can receive it. I admit I may be not getting something another might.
Gorthos – June 27, 2007 3:37 PM
http://www.gorthos.com/blog
Sheesh.. I start a new job, get a little busy catching up on some video gaming and boom, its a conspiracy as to where I am 🙂
for the record: Gary, your payment in the form of beautiful hand carved hardwood walking sticks will be delivered on July 21 whilst we eat, drink beer and giggle at silly men in tights in Centennial Park
CM: My laptop and blackberry JUST arrived in my office today. I have been luddite-boy for a couple of days.
Chris Taylor – June 27, 2007 7:50 PM
http://taylor.typepad.com
Gorthos: Go to the RIMarkable blog and look for the “Free BlackBerry Games” and “Free BlackBerry Downloads” categories. Then download like mad. And welcome to the Stonecutters.
gorthos – June 28, 2007 10:13 AM
http://www.gorthos.com/blog
Chris: most excellent. Thx
re Stonecutters: Hey, I get to sit beside Tom Baker!