“Much as I approve of the “green” focus - global warming isn’t the problem. Warming is a. probably going to happen with or without humans and b. not the main problem anyway. The real ecopocalypse deal is the mass extinction, pollution, deforestion, over-fishing and otherwise destruction of the natural world. If there are lots of species around, the ecosphere can cope with great changes, including warming, like it has done before now; but with the great removal of life, due to human incompetence and failure to manage ourselves and the resources we rely upon, then we’re really up that creek without much of anything let alone a paddle. Peace, etc.”

“Facebook is the modern day rolodex. It is the replacement for the business card.” Thought provoking, but no, it’s more than that, different from that.

All the SocNets are different from one another, although it’s becoming progressively more difficult to separate them as they take on one another’s attributes and respond to people’s actual usage.

Facebook (like MySpace, busy being forgotten but still twice as big) is also a venue for things to happen - e.g. causes, groups, events; Bebo is also a playspace. LinkedIn is supposedly more about “business” but actually tells you less about people in fact than the more “casual” and “expressive” networks do. The reason even business-oriented people are using Facebook more is surely because the more casual personal information being offered up there is also more revealing.

I think that your use and therefore your view of SocNets depends almost entirely on your psychology.

What surprises me is how SERIOUSLY everyone is taking Facebook profiles. Just because it’s a less messy interface, doesn’t make it any more real. Personally I take all information gleaned from profiles with a pinch of salt.

Thanks for a very thoughtful post.

Each of these social networks struggles hard to differentiate itself and this attracts sometimes only slightly different overlapping social groups, but sometimes very different, so to come up with overall rules which apply everywhere is almost impossible. What’s netiquette in MySpace is different to, say, Facebook, and certainly to Twitter where the demographic and expectations are based on knowledge of different social memes.

I do think there are class differences and that means manners differences. I wouldn’t dream of (for example) using **profanity in jest** within LinkedIn, but I certainly would in MySpace, where it’s de rigeur. Equally, if I write for a newspaper or journal, I am going to use / avoid certain turns of phrase, depending on the publishing outlet.

I am still surprised at the extent of personal information that people are prepared to freely offer up to Facebook, Twitter, Pownce, especially regarding their physical / geographical whereabouts. We’re possibly only a few moments away from criminal activity, based around someone knowing that someone else is miles from their home, and using that information to remove items of value in their absence. Now, unless you’re naturally suspicious you maybe won’t think in such terms of vulnerability; but this is where the danger lies in social networking - they are wide open to be exploited by anyone, from any background, with any motive, and we rather kid ourselves that the bubble we play inside is protective. It isn’t, and this is why people can get hurt. In the end, social networks are only as well behaved and pleasant as the people using them.

I totally agree that we, the great British public, are much more media savvy than the media and its regulators give us credit for.

There are many slots in broadcast where public AND personal opinion is clearly and effectively articulated without having to be news - for example, comedy: Rory Bremner, Dead Ringers, The Now Show - all these programmes are great at speaking the truth, albeit coloured with humour and large doses of cynicism, in a sometimes very detailed way, which does not hold back from comment, rather in fact benefits from it.

You’d think we’d have learned from Florida and the ‘hanging chads” saga just how dangerous it is to ignore wobbly voting systems…

BBC - Compost Your Corpse.

I always wanted a sky burial, like the native Americans, where the honured dead were left atop a hill on a bier for scavengers to recycle as per nature intended… Now I’m wondering whether there are sufficient carrion crows in England these days, or whether the zoo might chip in with some vultures and start a handy fund-raising activity.