"Social Networks"

This isn't going to be another commentary on the amazing ascent of Facebook, or Myspace, or YouTube. It's also not going to be an assault on the way every person over about 40 uses the names of those sites as verbs and doesn't really know what they are or how they work. Instead, you get a lament about the unwanted changes these can bring to the life of a lurker.

I joined Facebook about a month ago. I don't know why. As I have expressed previously, I have about as close to zero a desire to see anyone from high school as you can have. That's low. And if I hadn't gone to college with my wife and acquired some of her social moxie, I probably wouldn't talk to anyone from there either. So I've been getting those "X McX has added you as a friend" emails. Probably 10 of them. Not exactly a flood (now you know why), but enough that some sort of acceptance/declention policy had to be established in order to properly handle these and maintain my enigmatic/socially disabled state.

I'm still fuzzy on the value of Facebook. Or any "social networking" site. But let me get YouTube's back. YouTube is the best web creation since, well, maybe EVER. Just today, I watched several commercials for Bonkers, that candy from the mid to late 80s that featured giant fruit falling on people in the ads. This would have been impossible just three short years ago. Thank you, YouTube. Nostalgic for the 1997 Stanley Cup Finals? Yeah, me too. Facebook brings me emails from my sister's Grade 11 prom date. Not kidding. I don't want to find coworkers. I find them sometime between 8 and 10am 240 days per year. Maybe I'm about to get in touch with some really great person I've forgotten. But I doubt it. I'll keep you posted.