Connecting

So, lately my impression is that Facebook is being used by a lot of people beyond the teenage stereotype. For example, in addition to friends from grad school, and other scholars, artists, and new media hacktivists, there are serious theorists, but most of them are still acting goofy. I just joined the "Critical Theory and Theorists are Hot" group; it has 1685 members, including, for example, Judith Butler. Who actually posts. Granted, I haven't seen her post in the forum about which theorists are hotter, but still.

Also, people connected with the Yes Men, Ubermorgen, Neoism, are all using Facebook. --Actually, I wasn't surprised the neoists are in there; I'm surprised there aren't even more of them. Come on, only 14 Luther Blissetts? --Well, maybe 15, if you count "Luther bin Laden."

With the growing number of applications, some of which give users a surprising amount of control, and the ability to mash their accounts with Plazes, Tripadvisor, and other sites into their profiles, and given that Facebook is going to start offering development grants, I think the site could become like a programming interface for the web, for really naive users.

At least they start as naive. I hope it becomes like a gateway drug which then makes people want more control and let's them gradually learn how to take it. We'll see.