So my facebook experiment didn’t work out exactly as planned

Shortly after closing my facebook account due to privacy concerns, I got emails from a number of friends who told me they didn’t really use email anymore, or that they were having a party and it was a pain to contact me separately from everyone else.

I decided to remove my tinfoil hat and examine my reasons for leaving facebook more introspectively. While facebook surely shares, uses, stores and transmits our data for their own financial gain there is definitely a benefit to sharing the information.

Don’t get me wrong, I am still leery about what I post to the site and cringe when I see some of the personal information my friends are willing to post for everyone to see. I decided to open a new account to keep in touch with my friends and family; I guess this makes me a hypocrite. Oh well, I better stop thinking about it, I feel a draft on my head and this tinfoil hat could be back in place any minute.

Why it’s time to close your Facebook account

I’ll be closing my Facebook account tomorrow and I think you should too. In fact, you should message all your friends and tell them to close their accounts as well. Since its inception Facebook has constantly and consistently eroded its privacy features to the point that you can no longer keep your personal information secure. Do we care? The overwhelming consensus seems to say no. I am telling you that you should and I’ll give you a few reasons why.
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Simple network theory to help get your message out

Wondering why twitter isn’t driving the traffic you expected? Can’t figure out why only a small portion of your facebook contacts actually read your site regularly? Valdis Krebs (The Network Thinker) uses network theory and personal experience to give some tips on how Twitter can be used to effectively drive traffic to your site.

Snoop Dogg on differentiation and brand identity

Legendary rapper and businessman Snoop Dogg sat down with CNBC to talk a bit about how he created his personal brand and how he differentiates himself from the competition. Although he is not what you would traditionally consider a business icon or mentor, Snoop is very successful in both the music and media industry and as a serial business owner and entrepreneur.
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The social network operating system

Today I attended the IBM Academy of Technology’s annual meeting and saw Prof. Barry Wellman’s keynote talk entitled “Networked: The New Social Operating System”. Wellman’s talk (based on his soon to be released book of the same title) was centred around pervasive social networks and their effect on society, culture and everyday life. In this post I am going to summarize some of Wellman’s talking points and add some of the thoughts I took away from the lecture.

A quick note on Barry – as you might have guessed based on his research, Prof. Wellman is well connected and posts a lot of interesting information and papers. Check out his website, or follow him on twitter.

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