The brief #DeleteFacebook run was a different story. There is no obvious other place to go (and please don’t say WhatsApp, as that’s Facebook also). The network effect in social is much stronger than the liquidity effect in on demand transportation. So not only did #DeleteFacebook run out of steam quite quickly but it doesn’t appear to have impacted user numbers.
Agreed. I don’t think many people will delete/leave Facebook. For better or worse, they have the land-grab and network effect to make them the defacto digital social commons for most.
Yes, there are a multitude of reasons why we should not trust Facebook (among others) as we should not wholesale give them our data/identity. But, I do not think most will actually leave/delete Facebook, or stay away.
For my purposes, I’m slowly starting to change my signals as I work online. More on that to come. The direction I’m heading is informed by the IndieWeb models as detailed by Aaron Davis.
Davis states:
There seems to be two schools of thought on this:
– PESOS: Publish Elsewhere, Syndicate (to your) Own Site
– POSSE: Publish (on your) Own Site, Syndicate Elsewhere
Dries Buytaert’s graphic provides a useful breakdown of the differences.
This is the direction I’m choosing to head. I’m test-driving this and will share guidance as I learn and create. But…sometime soon…I’ll head out on this new path, and most likely upset my friends/followers, and the networks/systems themselves. Despite this possible negative reaction as I reboot my relation to these discourse systems…I think this is the better path.
What about the bots?
Also, in regards to the link above, I definitely think there is a need/opportunity to have a bot to represent you online.
I’ve been interested by the thinking by Tim Ferriss about outsourcing your life. This means that he pays someone to handle small tasks for him. This could be conducting research or scheduling meetings. I’ve heard examples of people that hire someone overseas to “worry” for you…so you don’t spend time worrying before that big project or presentation.
I’ve also tested the use of bots in my classes and MOOCs as a possible “teaching assistant” for learners. I think there is a very real use in these instances. Some times students just want to be heard, or feel like someone is listening. Some times they don’t know, or care that it is a bot that is doing all of the work.
As I build up outside work and expand my digital identity, I’ve thought about hiring someone to maintain these signals so I can focus on deeper work/thinking. If I were rich and famous, no one would think twice about me having someone else monitor my feeds. Heck…this morning Eminem just made news because he decided to take back control of his Twitter feed.
Why wait until I’m rich and famous to have this form of service. If I could automate, and train a bot to handle my digital self I would definitely do that. My bot could get in and wish happy birthday to individuals as Facebook notifies me. When someone sends me a note on Twitter, I could have the bot respond back, and keep the dialogue running. I would definitely have a bot handle my email inbox and knock out the random requests that fly in.
Would this mean that in the future we might have a place where my bot is talking to your bot all day long, and deciding things for us? Yep. I’d train my bot to send me the stuff it cannot handle. Everything else…I’d happily ignore.
In many ways, we’re slowly seeing AI injected into our email services, calendars, and social apps. The devices are slowly starting to try and give a value add. I for one cannot wait. Sign me up. I’ve got bigger things to think about. 🙂