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Not ready for review | | | A post-structuralist interpretation of facebook profiles - Has the medium become the message? | |
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< | Prima facie, facebook seems to be another capitalist experiment, attempting to monetize personal relationships and acquaintances through heavy data profiling and processing of the personal information of its users. Through a user-friendly interface, the site offers nothing more than a hosting service for its users, coupled with real simple syndication functionality. In that sense, it adds no additional value, its primary use being that of passive mediation between already existing relationships (while simultaneously acting as a massive information gathering tool for for-profit purposes). Indeed, Mr. Zuckerberg does very little to fiddle with what he offers, simply sitting back and watching as millions of facebook users voluntarily upload their personal data, ID details, photographs and lists of their favorite consumer objects: once in receipt of this vast database of human beings, Facebook then simply has to sell the information back to advertisers. It's success, although indisputable as a fact, may be attributed to a simple mimetic response, magnified by network effects, as more people jumped on the site's bandwagon. Sinister, exciting or just addictive, facebook plays an important role as a communication tool for its 400+ million user base. But what if the every facebook profile is not simply point of reference for a corresponding user, but something more, or something less, depending on perspective. | >
> | At a glance, facebook seems to be another capitalist experiment, attempting to monetize personal relationships and acquaintances through heavy data profiling and processing of the personal information of its users. Through a user-friendly interface, the site offers nothing more than a hosting service for its users, coupled with real simple syndication functionality. In that sense, it adds no additional value, its primary use being that of passive mediation between already existing relationships (while simultaneously acting as a massive information gathering tool for for-profit purposes). Indeed, Mr. Zuckerberg does very little to fiddle with what he offers, simply sitting back and watching as millions of facebook users voluntarily upload their personal data, ID details, photographs and lists of their favorite consumer objects: once in receipt of this vast database of human beings, Facebook then simply has to sell the information back to advertisers. It's success, although indisputable as a fact, may be attributed to a simple mimetic response, magnified by network effects, as more people jumped on the site's bandwagon. Sinister, exciting or just addictive, facebook plays an important role as a communication tool for its 400+ million user base. But what if the every facebook profile is not simply point of reference for a corresponding user, but something more, or something less, depending on perspective. | | | According to psychologist Derek Draper, facebook cleverly taps into the modern desire for "continual surface stimulation": "There is something about our culture that pushes us towards activities that are hypnotically shallow, rather than committing to something more profoundly." In a similar context, people may join facebook on the pretense that they want to stay in touch with other people; gradually however, the site may become a gap-filler, taking a increasing amount of their everyday lives, "as it mimics the playground insecurities of primary school kids piling up best friends to find their social niche". |
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