Les Bonnes Choses

Wow! Some weekend, hey? This year I've experienced some pretty extreme weather in Chicago, from snowmageddon to record heat and associated storms bringing flooding, knocking over grand trees and taking my power out with them.

And then there's Amy Winehouse.

Police have said the cause of her death is being treated as "unexplained," and have said speculation that she might have suffered an overdose is "inappropriate."

They're right, of course. It could have been a grizzly attack.

So, now that I'm "on vacation", I'm continuing a post I started a couple days ago. And because I'm so meta, I wanted to write about how the process of barfing up one's half-digested thoughts has become complicated. I have no thoughts about Twitter, as I have never used it, but I do make use of Facebook, LinkedIn and now Google+ (sort of).

Facebook

The grand-daddy of social networking sites. Or maybe not grand-daddy. Maybe a great-uncle whose extensive collection of Norman Rockwell prints leaves you feeling just a little uncomfortable. I don't mind facebook so much, except they seem to step into some kind of a privacy issue every other month. That, and those bloody apps that -- sorry if you've been inviting me to play them with you -- I block as a matter of course. 9 times out of 10, I'm just on there in the mood to be a smartarse.

LinkedIn

One thing that keeps my smartarsery in check on Facebook is that I'm associated with "respectable" people on there. LinkedIn seems to be the place to maintain those connections. It doesn't seem to be possible to post pictures there, which is just as well, as I think photos are responsible for 99% of the hilarity that ensues on social networking sites. And in general, commentary I see on LinkedIn is very professionally directed. It's been interesting to see some of my former colleagues issue statements about topics and using jargon I would never have expected to hear from them just a couple of years ago.

Google+

Holy crap, Google, what are you trying to do to me here? I'm still trying to work out what, if any, role Google+ might play. I know some people are drawn to Google+ because it's not Facebook; some of them have abandoned Facebook accounts. But for those who are already heavily invested in Facebook, playing with the new kid on the block requires a doubling of effort.




I see this in terms of duplicating material published to Facebook, and in trying to make sense of the structure and concepts they use in their implementation of a social network. Given the culture at Google ("do no evil"), my gut feeling is that Google is going to end up with a platform that I would tend to prefer. Unfortunately, that leaves me somewhat ambivalent at the moment.