Social networking

An interesting observation about my personal life that I would be shocked if it didn't expand to most of my generation.

I am comfortable if not overly willing to network via the Internet but am hesitant or unsure in person.

I don't mean to say I don't like meeting new individuals in my field. In fact it's quite the opposite.

Instead it is the method. I have spent the last few month expanding my digital footprint, updating linkedIn, Coroflot and facebook profiles, starting a Twitter account, and posting on various design blogs. All of this is natural if not second nature to me. Then, about a month ago, I met an individual and exchanged business cards. A seemingly natural transaction, I have become used to digital networking and this physical transaction threw me off.

Now there are many articles out about new social media and networking. What they all fail to address is the need to preserve physical networking as well.

Technology is moving social networking forward and it is infinitely easier to stay in touch with people, but are we losing simple human interactions?

Good Marketing?

Driving out to Squirrel Hill recently I saw a billboard that read:
Text BELIEVE to shortcode.

Now I don't remember the short code and have no intention of sending that message but it got me thinking about some new marketing technology has enabled.

The billboard was consumed with maybe 18 characters total. And they were white letters on a red board. Very noticeable-very clear- the message told me what to do and it was my decision wether or not to follow it.

I am curious though what type of information I would have received had I sent that text.

I assume it is put up by a religious organization so would I get a quote from a book of prayer?

Would it start an SMS conversation with a higher being?

Would it charge my account an absurd amount of money?

What type of spam list would I be subjecting myself to?

Or is it all an elaborate social experiment of a bored researcher to see how many hits the billboard will actually summon.

Regardless of the reason the direct messaging is fascinating and I am curious how the marketing team decided on a brief viral campaign over an image or text heavy message.

online social communities

So i have recently over doubled the number of social networks i belong to. I dont expect to use all of them but I am trying to
1a. Make a digital footprint
2b. Discover the positive and negatives of all the interfaces

Previously a member of:
facebook
linkedIn
Blogger

Newly a member of:
xanga, dont plan to use it though since i have blogger
twitter, i know, i'm a late adopter, i think i'm already addicted though
crackberry, though i havent made a username yet
ixda.org

So yeah, overall no one has a completely perfect solution which isnt much of a surprise but its interesting to see the positives and negatives of each.

Oh, and as far as twitter goes, check it out at
twitter.com/dafark8

Basically it is going to become
1a. a list of what i just did and where i am, as twitter was designed for
2b. a list of random design observations and thoughts - stream of consciousness style thanks to mobile