I’ve never read Malcolm Gladwell’s book “Tipping Point” but something inside me feels on the edge. Some kind of epidemic at that intersection of technology advance and human desire seems to be going down.
Facebook is all at once touted as saviour and villan. Dave Slusher points out what others are thinking. Cam’s talking about Telstra and being pinged by Techcrunch.
Mike’s trying (very well) to explain what it is we’re feeling as Stephen Downes echos similar sentiments and Laurel explains definitions and points us to where in Facebook the RSS is hidden.
It appears everywhere there’s a (natural) tendency to want to put things in neat boxes and try and grab some stability (sit down in the boat folks!)
JP is writing the Facebook Enterprise Epistles in parts 1, 2 and 3, with 4 soon to come (which will be my favourite as he is going to tie it into Four Pillars). Doc’s staying away (wise man is Doc, well, busy man too). There’s two very interesting juxtapositions right there from two people I admire immensely.
Certainly, to the Enterprises which see Facebook as a villan, it’s a villan that represents OPEN – even though to the people in the masses formerly know as the audience, Facebook and Web 2.0 still doesn’t seem to be as open as it ought. Showing open means different things to different folk in different spheres.
Of course, I think it’s all very interesting, even if I do feel a bit twitchy. The one thing it is, no matter where you sit or view it from, is OPEN. The discussions need to be had and aired. And we need to be patient and listen and not shoot ourselves in the foot, or anyone else in the midst of it.
Facebook or no Facebook, my friend Roy still seems to me one of the most open people I know.
Change is all around. Even this morning in Second Life, my favourite Elf had turned into a Nun. Seemed stangely odd hugging a Nun with the name Silkcharm.
However in the midst of it all, I’ve had one main thought for the last few days – Where’s my friend Kent?
I guess that thought echoes on what community really means.
Don’t worry about the technology people – the walls on that will come down with the walls around our hearts.
Peace.
Dave
Image ArtistsHeartMechanicsBrain by dkart.
Technorati Tags: doc searls, malcolm gladwell, tipping point, mike seyfang, laurel papworth, dave slusher, roy blumenthal, facebook, open, openness, closedvopen, stephen downes, jp rangaswami, kent newsome
life tools 
I wish I had said that!!
(you will, Mike, you will 😉
Thought you would see the big picture. Glad you were able to describe it so well.
Fang – Mike Seyfang
Hey Dave,
Wonderfully poignant as always! I’m brewing up so many thoughts on this subject, as it seems is the whole web. I’ve been reading other’s thoughts all day, and plan to get a whole load offline to read on the train and hopefully share later via the Yak.
~biff~
P.S. The Dave Slusher link goes to a GoDaddy holding page pending renewal or deletion…
Gday.
Seems Dave had problem with his domain. See this post.
I changed the original link now. The original one went to a podcast whereas <a href="http://www.evilgeniuschronicles.org/wordpress/2007/07/17/why-i-dropped-scoble-and-seceded-from-the-hunt-for-newer-shinier-things/this one here is a blog post and the one I wanted to link to in the first place.
Read from that link and the following few days you should get the gist.
Dave
Thanks for the links and sorry for the consternation about the domain. Expiring domain + no email notifications + very busy week = bad scene.
I think the point I failed to emphasize enough is that this isn’t really about Facebook per se. It may well be a fine site, it just suffers from being the 20th thing like these that people want me to join and went open to the non-student public right about the time I was completely burned out on the mode. Where Scoble set me off was with the idea that to communicate with people you have to be lined up on whatever fad they are currently high on. How can you possibly manage what every single person is using and when they switch. It’s just ridiculous.
Thanks for caring about whatever nonsense I’m spouting.