This morning during my drive to work I heard some interesting figures about Facebook. It seems that ever since the social networking site has gone public (i.e not college student exclusive) it has grown by leaps and bounds. According to the morning news segment I heard on WTTS, if Facebook users were given their own country, their population would be equal to that of Brazil. In fact the average number of friends among users is 150. This staggers me a bit. But there was one last figure that stuck in my mind – the fastest growing population segment for Facebook users is the 35 to 55 age range.
Now I have yet to join Facebook. With three different emails plus two other social/entertainment sites that I regularly use, another website to moniter is just one too many right now. Hearing about the statistics for Facebook made me think a bit about adoption of technology and what makes one site wildly popular and another site fail to garner recognition. I think that what Facebook has going for it (and really what is true of most successful technology applications) is the ability to connect people with each other and with the things that they love. Technology for it’s own sake doesn’t provide enough of a carrot to lure people to it’s use. And while there will always be a select group of people that choose to learn something because it is there, I feel like this is a very small percentage of the general percentage.
Libraries, I think, need to recognize this need for practicality in its application of technology. While podcasts are an intriguing application of technology, if it doesn’t fulfill an explicit need, then I wonder how often it is played. Instead of technology for technology’s sake, I feel like we, as librarians (and future librarians), need to further explore how we can use technology to re-forge the bonds of community. Some of the Next Gen catalogs are attempting to explore this need for connectivity. It’s my assertion that this feature that will prove most important.
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I was hesitant to join Facebook as well. I thought it was just one more thing like myspace that I had to post things to. But after using Facebook for over four months now, I can say that I like it so much better than myspace. For one thing, I do not get the creepy friend requests like I did on myspace. I also don't get random emails from weird people. Facebook seems to be more "academic" in nature for me because I also network with my co-workers and the library I work at. I do not get the spam that I got in myspace either and that is nice.
ReplyDeleteBecause of my dislike for myspace, I am going to cancel my account. I just don't see a point in having both of them anymore. For what it's worth, I'm glad I joined facebook and gave it a try.
Thank you for the excellent point you make, that "technology for it’s own sake doesn’t provide enough of a carrot to lure people to it’s use." I feel that it is often easy to forget that while podcasts and wikis are great, if they aren't actively fulfilling a need, they are very unlikely to be used. I know I seldom click on podcasts/blogs just on a whim...if I'm going to spend time on it and time paying attention to it, it has to be something I need to know (or am at least interested in). I am intrigued by the idea of using these things as a way to re-forge the bonds of community...thank you for putting that idea in my head!
ReplyDeleteI read a similar story about the popularity of Facebook and especially how it's attracting an older generation. I have several baby boomer "friends" on there and I think it's great! What Facebook really has going for it now is the sheer number of people on there. Since all age groups are on there, chances are you'll have a large network of friends, wheras Myspace attracts a younger generation, Twitter attracts more of a techie crowd, etc.
ReplyDeleteI heard the same report on NPR and was astounded to think of Facebook as being the same size as Brazil. Amazing!
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