Friends and Social Networks Here - Uh... WTF?

[Jeff Harrington]

Our mutual online acquaintance Daniel Wolf blogs very indirectly about our new site here - and I think it evinces some misperceptions about what we're trying to do.

Asocial

First of all, I hate social networks. This whole friend thing is such B.S. (Although the day I type this is the same day that one of my best friends from Sesame Street - and a guy that Elsie even painted a huge portrait of - contacts me out of the blue with Facebook - weird. He dropped out to hike and disappeared.)

I always just agree to any friend request. Well, not if they're an obvious porn site, etc. But give me a break, all those stupid Facebook apps. Whiskeys, Polls, HotorNots. I've gotten a few nice contacts through MySpace, but lemme tell you why we set up this site.

It's for talking and listening. Just ignore the stupid Friends stuff here. None of us really give a shit about who's got more friends, etc. There's no point! It came with the package! Some of this Social Network stuff is built into the Ning business model. But it's free so what the hell.

I wanted to build a place that wasn't stuffy, where all the cool people I've met over the years (in web time) could hang out and chat about music. The fact that it was easy to put up, and easy to add music and videos, just made it seem a no-brainer. But the main thing is this - THIS AIN'T NO FREAKIN SOCIAL NETWORK!

There got that off my chest. Now please stop sending me Friend requests!!! And Daniel stop dissing us like any of us give a shit about this social network phake phony phriendcrap. MK?

;-)

[J.C. Combs]

The social networks sort of evolved off the the mp3.com, etc., model, but when that happened music pages were diluted by packaging genres all into one place, because the bread and butter (cant believe i just threw that term out there lol) for social networks, of course, is friend networking. So its a breath of fresh air to be able to have a "page" where it sits among other people interested in the same thing. And, as you said, the ease of adding music and videos is killer. Just the set up process alone through email was surprising, how quick it was. I'm telling friends who I invite that it literally takes a minute or two to set up, but some probably think they will be fishing around their page, trying to find the add music or add photo options.

[Jeff Harrington]

Main thing for me too, was that Ning handles the software mainentance, the DB backups, there is no cost to host the site, etc. And it's easy to write new stuff to their API if we want to. I'm looking into how to add the New Music reBlog as a Tab here, like Forums.

[Steve Layton]

You may hate them, Jeff, but at the end of the day that's what this is. It's a network, whose "society" is creators and lovers of new music. You join and suddenly you're one click away from interacting with anyone else here.

Sure, the careful semanticist gags when these general tags are applied by Ning, Myspace, or Facebook: all of us are "bands", all our compositions and performances are "songs" and "tracks", and everyone we link to is a "friend". Personally, the whole "friends" thing is a way to kind of bookmark musicians I either know or highly value, and I have no problem using it. It may sound phony, but in an environment like Myspace it can work to gather a whole constellation of wonderful musicians from all over, bring them into focus out of the vast pool of other kinds of music, all around one person's "friend" nexus... Which can lead someone on to another's friends cloud, etc etc... With a few billion of us out there (or even just a few million, talking specifically about new-music lovers), it's one of the few ways we have to help guide us to who and what we're searching for, and the other way around are searching for music like ours.

Someday maybe someone will make a service that replaces "friends" and "songs" with terms more useful to who we are. But we'd be pretty silly sit back and wait for that moment before we jumped in, right?

[paul bailey]

you are right. its not a social network its really an "anti-social" network.

or to quote woody allen "i'd never join a club that would allow a person like me to become a member" (or something like that)

[Jeff Harrington]

Haha.. good one. But Grouch Marx said that, Allen quoted it, and I've used it about a zillion times. NetNewMusic - The Anti-Social Music Network! I like it!

paul bailey said:

you are right. its not a social network its really an "anti-social" network.

or to quote woody allen "i'd never join a club that would allow a person like me to become a member" (or something like that)

[J.C. Combs]

"NetNewMusic - The Anti-Social Music Network!"

2nd that, that is a GREAT tag line.... No shit.

[Steve Layton]

Sorry but Anti-Social music is already taken by a group I've known from both Sequenza21 (hiya, Andrea) and Myspace -- where, by the way, they have 1216 "friends".


J.C. Combs said:

"NetNewMusic - The Anti-Social Music Network!"

2nd that, that is a GREAT tag line.... No shit.

[Elliot Cole]

The reason I'm here is simple. I think it is important to be part of a scene -- and fundamental to a definition of such a thing would be:
A few close friends
A lot of loose acquaintances
In a place where there are lots of strangers
where -- most importantly -- it is possible for people to flow across those boundaries. That requires infrastructure, public space. In high school it was a coffee shop. In college, uh, Valhalla? In (my version of) Houston, not much of anything.

I NEED virtual barely-friends, if only to open the possibility of flow.

[and I glad to see that I'm not the only one always hoping for Daniel's approval!]

[David Ocker]

Jeff wrote: "THIS AIN'T NO FREAKIN SOCIAL NETWORK!"

Does that mean I have to cancel the hot date I already made because I joined this group?

No - wait. That was another secret online personality.

Jeff also wrote: "And it's easy to write new stuff to their API if we want to"

Does that mean you can just change the word "Friends" to something else (leaving the functionality the same)? Here's a list of synonyms of "friend" (scroll down a bit.)

You could ask Daniel to pick one that doesn't offend him.

I'm sort of partial to "soulmate" - it would give the place a sort of funky 70's vibe.

No - wait.

[Mauro Graziani]

Well, I remember about 20 years ago in France there was a group called the anti-socials associated. Interesting idea.

I don't hate social networks. I hate this kind of kiddish organization with list of friends and so on. So, I agree with Jeff Harrington: It's for talking and listening. Just ignore the stupid Friends stuff here.

The power of sharing musical infos, ideas and opinions is great. And maybe I can also practice and improve my english ;-)

[Steve Moshier]

NetNewMusic, JESUS, it's: an opportunity, a vehicle, a forum, teleological, a 'chance', a glimpse, a venue, a chronicle, FUN, renewed optimism, spontaneous, "needed", refreshing, inspiring, "worth it", "easy", and a ton more I can't think of. Continue.

[David Beardsley]

The friends thing:

It puts people I know on one menu so I can find them and check their page out to see what's happening. It would be nice if the members menu could be sorted by last name, then first name so I could find folks.