The Real How Social Media Changed My Life -OR- How I discovered how incredibly uninteresting I really am.

I titled the last post , and honestly, I talked about the spaghetti monster map, not about Social Media. So, the title wasn't honest. And the content was clearly on the side of snoring-at-the-keyboard boring.

Really, social media has not changed my life. Not that much, if at all. I still sit in loft here at the house working everyday. I am sitting here alone. I am answering questions via phone, work's instant messging system and e-mail. I do usually have an app or two running on one of the machines that monitors some of the social networking sites where there are people I actually might follow, and Linux apps exist to present the activity/update/life stream.
And watching, normally just out of the corner of my eye is pretty much all I do. I don't interact. I don't participate in any of that Social Network's games. And I most certainly don't let those games or apps or whatever have posting rights to my activity stream. That way leads madness.
Yes, I'm boring.
A lot of it is that I don't believe that unless someone is asking a question, they probably don't really want to know what I have to say about their topic. And sometimes I would say that that includes simple things like "like/dislike."

One of the aspects of social networking, specifically Facebook, that I dislike is the apps.
Partially, I don't trust them. I don't want them prompting me to spam my friends about the app, just so I can advance in the virtual world of that game. Increasing my rewards based on the number of people I bring in, isn't' that a ponzi scheme? I post enough useless noise on my own, I don't need an app helping me along there.
Of course, Facebook also provides a way for me to hide the updated from applications I've determined I don't want to see. Now if there was just a way to opt out of some of these apps the first time a notice hits my screen.
And just so everyone knows, at some point, I will drop defriend you if most of your Facebook activity is automated updates or invites from games.

I realize that how I use Facebook, Twitter and other social networks is probably somewhat different from how other people use them. I don't go out of my way to look for new people to add. Even when someone I know is suggested, odds are I'm not going to try to add someone unless I really think I want to follow him or her, the the person has done something to suggest they may be interested in plugging into my personal inane and sometimes insane activity stream. And I much prefer environments where the relationship can be unbalanced, as in I can subscribe to your stream without you having to subscribe to mine. Twitter does this better. Plurk probably does this best, with normal people being able to say one is a friend or a fan, without any assumption of how the new friend or fan feels about the guy initiating the contact.

Of course, feeling like I'm forcing innocents to suffer my personal brand of insanity, half-conceived ranting and raving and the vagrancies of what passes as my mind is most of the reason I never really got into forums. So why should I force you to suddenly care about what I think, even if it's packaged in 140 characters or less?
Really, I'm boring. I am not that interesting. And even I think most of my writing is an awful example of the English language.

How interesting can I be when after eight hours of sitting at my desk all day, I spend about eight more hours sitting at the same desk, doing things that look a hell of a lot like the things I spent the first 8 hours doing? I work on FileNet Image Management systems. I play with Alfresco content management. I work with Oracle databases at work. I play with MySQL and PostgreSQL databases. At work, I perform capacity planning and data mapping. May I show you the maps I made of the social networking sites I use to manage my personal social network?

And before you say I need to find a hobby--may I talk to you about coffee? No, not that sludge you picked up at the corner store. I mean real, honest, good, well made, quality that shows in the cup COFFEE (usually in an espresso form factor, but press pot is starting to be fun).
Where was I? . . . Oh yes, social network . . .

I have written before about how on the topic of social networks. I have posted about why I was terminating my accounts with a few social network sites.

Social networking has replaced a lot of communication I would have used e-mail for in the past. It's actually become the primary way I communicate with certain people (Hi, Yvonne!). And there are people I would NEVER have phone numbers for if they hadn't put their number on Facebook (and had it synced to my Droid, not that I can think of why I might call, or I'd already have your number).

I will still look at social networking and web 2.0 sites. But right now I feel I need to focus more time on my own site, this site. And if no one else ever bothers to make their way from their social network of choice to here . . . I'm not really sure you're actually missing anything.
But I'd love to hear what you think.