The point is this whole trend of social networking. Whether it is Tribe.net, Friendster, or LinkedIn, they are banking on one little aspect – we would share our rolodex, and build up a network of our own, and of course somehow more links would be formed.
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The question I have is: why the F**K should I share my network of contacts with these commercial entities. They are like BlogSpot that does nothing for my brand equity and in many ways chews me out after making the network connections. Thus what I want is a “MoveableType” of social networking. Blogs took off because it was about one person – me. My social networks should be of my making for me. Lets figure out a way to cut out the middlemen.
The deal killer for me is the requirement that we all give away our hard-won networks of colleagues and friends to a system that doesn’t preserve the nuances of how we manage those relationships. Some people you can call to shoot the breeze with and maybe spark off an idea, others you only call when you have the whole thing hashed out. Others you don’t call: they call you. I haven’t seen a social network website that allows you to sort your contacts this way.
And the other aspect of this is that the people worth networking with are not in these networks: the website services are optimistically hoping that they’ll build sufficient critical mass that Steve Jobs or John Doerr signs up as a member. As if either of them needs an introduction . . . . .