Social networking sites rate and review.

Written By Dean Jullie (41188424)

Introduction

To begin I should put it out there that I have fallen for social websites and fallen hard at that. When I’m at my computer there seems to be less and less to do other than logging into the five or so social websites to which I belong. It seems I feel content when I get to my Facebook page and there is a comment or friend request waiting for me, however; when there’s not a single comment or request aimed at me I begin to experience disappointment and a little despair. I believe the true experience is when one of every type of social website is combined together, thus providing the user with a complete and satisfactory social experience.

Background

The following topics will take a look at five different social websites each aimed to expand your social network via the internet.

Facebook

Facebook is a social site that provides users with the technology to SPAM APPLICATION REQUESTS. But on a serious note Facebook is a social website that is simply a means for someone to keep in touch with and share photos with their friends. Another quirky feature of Facebook is the applications feature, the applications you can use in Facebook once selected, are linked to your profile and can show different things ranging from sending a friend an e-beer or throwing an e-sheep at someone. The main focus for Facebook is the friends database, Facebook’s combination of messages super pokes and pictures make it a pretty decent way of keeping in touch with friends from school, friends overseas or just your close friends.

Google Calendar

Pretty much what it reads, Google Calendar is an online equivalent to the Microsoft outlook calendar system. This social site allows the tracking and viewing of other users calendars. While this software/website may sound un-secure the process is restricted to how much information you choose to upload onto the online calendar. As a user you can edit your calendar to show details such as work shifts, university times or general catch-up with friend dates.

Twitter

Twitter belongs in a class of its own when it comes to status updates. Once logged into the website a user can simply update their status. Twitter faces everyone with a single question ‘What are you doing?’, then in 140 words or less you write your status and post it to the site. Anyone following your profile will be able to read your status, it’s that simple. Twitter also takes this status notification setup one step further by adding an external element, the mobile phone. If selected twitter can send you text notification messages whenever the people your following update their status. Likewise you can update your status via mobile phone.

Last.FM

Last.FM is the ‘Social Music Revolution’ or so they claim. Last.FM provides an online music service to users where whenever a user listens to a track on their computer the details of that song are uploaded to your page. Last.FM provides a way to add friends, contact friends and see what your music compatibility rating with other people is.

Flickr

Last but not least we have Flickr, this is a very neat and tidy way of sharing images you as a user upload with the rest of the Flickr community. When an image is uploaded tags can be added making that image searchable on Flickr. Users can leave comments on any images they view adding a feedback element to the user’s experience.

Focus

The focus of this reflection is to provide an insight into the way I view online social networking sites and a little into how, when combined they provide a full experience.

Feedback

From first being a member of only the one social website aimed at maintaining friends online, I have been introduced to multiple forms of online social networking. There are many websites that collate information about users for fun purposes but do not really count as social sites, for example What Pulse is an online community that is team based where each user uploads data from their computer containing the number of keystrokes and clicks that have been made. Each team then gets a ranking on how well they are doing in comparison to everyone else. This site has little to no communication between its members and provides no quick or current feedback to the user. A social networking site must in my opinion be so simple and feature packed that our grandparents could use it.

One thing that does come into question when using the online social sites is security and how much information should you really post on your profiles. The answer to this question is a relatively simple one, the amount of information available to the world is directly in proportion to the amount of information you choose to apply to your profile. I for one use a separate email address for work purposes and a not so important email address for social websites or anything online for that matter. My second email address contains limited information about myself; likewise do my profiles on social websites. Having basic security like this enables users to in a sense hide behind their online screen name.

Now to the more important side of my experience with online social networking, how well they worked. If I was to pick a favourite site it would be Facebook, now I’m not saying I love Facebook because I don’t its just that it combines images and text and even some music all in one as well it is probably the easiest to find friends and meet people with. The worst experience I have had on one of these sites would defiantly have to be Google Calendar, this being said if I was a really organised person and had the use for a calendar like this I would probably find it a lot more useful. As it stands I don’t have any use for Google Calendar, unless my workplace started using it to show us shifts and we could add our availability (now to get my boss using a computer hmmm). Flickr would probably come in second last, sure its good and neat at what it does but the social side of it is a lacking a little something. When searching through the images on Flickr I find that I don’t really search through the pictures with the intent to comment on a picture. I feel that’s how most users would find it and therefore it seems to me that Flickr doesn’t do as good a job as Facebook’s photo management.

Twitter is the site that I would rank reasonably high as well; Twitter even has a Facebook application allowing your twitter status to be shown in Facebook. Twitter provides a status notification system that far outreaches many of its competitors, the fact that mobile phone technology has been brought into it means great accessibility which means easier to use and can be used more frequently. The ‘Social Music Revolution’ Last.FM is pretty fun to use I will give it that, providing up to date information on what songs your friends and colleagues are listening to and weekly statistics like top artists and top songs. Last.Fm to me lacks the common social networking that some of the other sites provide, I think, however; Last.FM was intended to run like it is as more of a singular use site.

Conclusion

In my opinion most of the sites I have learnt and used have their key features which make them unique and usable; using a combination of your favourite social networking sites is, in my opinion the way to go. If your not a big music fan and don’t like knowing what your friends listen to then don’t sign up with Last.FM, likewise if you don’t really have a need to share your pictures and comments on others pictures Flickr isn’t for you. I think now, knowing all of these sites exist I will find it hard to quit one or the other sites as long as my friends continue to use them. I think the best experience possible for online social networking doesn’t just come from one website; it will come from your tailor made selection of social sites.

References

1. What Pulse.
   Keystroke counting team based site.
   http://whatpulse.org/

2. Facebook.
   Social networking site.
   http://www.facebook.com/

3. Last.FM.
   Social music site, shows recently played tracks.
   http://www.last.fm/

4. Flickr.
   Picture / photo sharing site.
   http://www.flickr.com/

5. Google Calendar.
   Public Calender website.
   http://www.google.com/calendar/render/

6. Twitter.
   Status notification site, also utilises mobile technology.
   http://twitter.com/