The Facebook Promise: Cool or Just Cold?

Do you Facebook? Why do you Facebook? How many friends do you have? How many Facebook friends do you have? Is there a difference? Should there be a difference? We could have quite a conversation on these four questions, if only we could actually converse. Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and all the other "social networking" sites might be signs that we aren't talking much anymore, or, worse yet, could be contributing factors to the absence of meaningful communication. Since blogging doesn't let us have a real conversation, let's tackle this as best we can, and you can respond with your thoughts and perspectives via the comments section which follows. The good news about "comments" is that you can, well, comment. The bad news is that the blog-comment-respond process tends to move us more toward statements and away from inquiry and genuine interchange. For example, if we were in an actual conversation right now, you could ask a simple question: "what's the difference? What do you mean?" And I could respond, and we could wind up following any number of threads, playing off each other, going deeper into the underlying substance and meaning of our interaction. However, we aren't in conversation. We may not even be in communication (more on that difference in a bit). So that leaves me with writing something, trying to make a point or establish a line of thought by a series of statements. You get to respond via comments, and comments tend to be the same thing in reverse - since you can't converse, you are likely to write something back ranging from agreement to disagreement, typically in the form of statements about your point of view. And so we exchange points of view, arguments, agreements or disagreements, never really knowing if either of us has truly understood or connected with the other. Sure, we have the kind of connection indicated by responses exchanged, but we never really know how well or how deeply we are connecting with one another. So where am I going with this and what does it have to do with Facebook or social networking? Glad I asked! Facebook, according to the Facebook corporate page, "is a social utility that helps people communicate more efficiently with their friends, family and coworkers. The company develops technologies that facilitate the sharing of information through the social graph, the digital mapping of people's real-world social connections." So, Facebook helps people communicate (more efficiently) and share information through real world social connections. Hmmmm. Let's look at those two distinctions. Does Facebook really help you communicate at all, much less more efficiently? That depends on what you mean by communication. Continue reading on The Huffington Post