OK, so maybe it's just me, but all this Social Networking is just too much pressure! I have more guilt now than when I was a young mother sure I was the worst person in the world because I didn't find every living moment with my child the most satisfying of my life.
Just how many Social Networking sites can one person stay current on and still have time to eat, breath, work, and take a shower?
There is Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Digger, Gather, 43 Things, Orkut, Badoo, Friendster, Reunion, LinkedIn, my own Web site, Amazon Blog, Red Room and Blogger. I'm sure there are many others and those more narrowly focused.
Frankly, I have a difficult time making sense of most of the Twitter messages that come through my page.
When I finally get up the courage to visit my Facebook page, I realize how errant I am at answering the many nice notes from current friends and those I haven't seen in years. It's horrible. I'm such a total Facebook failure.
Have you noticed all those little icons after you complete a blog Just like here on the Huff Post? You see that little line-up of cute, colorful characters just waiting to be clicked so one can share every thought that comes to mind via all Web sites and blogs in existence.
I've thought about resigning from all the social networks I've signed on to but I'm not strong enough to go cold turkey.
Everything I read about Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Digger say that if I'm not "there" I'm "nowhere." I will become a non-person on the Internet. The only people who will see my brilliant prose will be just my friends, not strangers.
To become invisible is just too horrible to imagine. I don't think I have the courage to turn away from something becoming the fastest growing online Web site ever.
A Nielsen Survey said from February 2008 to February 2009, showed Twitter growth at 1,382 percent. Those are very daunting odds to ignore.
So, I guess I'll hang out online a little longer. Maybe I'll get the strength to begin a withdrawal program.
Is there a patch for this?
Geri Spieler is the author of, "Taking Aim At The President: The Remarkable Story of the Woman Who Shot At Gerald Ford." Palgrave Macmillan
I agree, the random stream of Twitter messages gets a bit out of hand. I wish they'd made the max a bit more than 140 characters... I really don't think that helps anything.
I quickly learned that 95% of these people were not marginally interesting to me, and I couldn't possibly read the thousands of tweets, and they probably weren't reading mine either. So I gave it up.
I recently re-joined (new account) and made it a point to only follow people who I found inspiring or who posted links to articles and art that I liked. I have a small following now, and I enjoy it thoroughly. And more of them respond to my tweets, and I respond to theirs.
It's a nice service if you stay away from the name-collectors and spammers (and whatever you do, avoid the Etsy sellers - they spam like crazy!!)
If Twitter is microblogging, than they are creating microblogs that are basically infomercials. The definition of spam. That's not what Twitter is for.
Thanks for commenting.
I don't disagree that Twitter is good for news updates. But, of course, if you "follow" CNN, you get a gazillion other sites that come along with it.
Twitter feels like the latest "thing" and everyone is jumping on the cool wagon. No one wants to be out of it, you know.
And then, of course, like Facebook, MySpace et al, there are these "friends" who show up that you never heard of and most likely don't want to associate with either. Who are these people and why do they want to be my friend?
I'm not sure I need Twitter for a news update. If I have to log in to Twitter to see news, why don't I just log in to the New York Times? It would make the process faster as I only need one log in instead of two?