Social networking is a race to the bottom

If George Orwell or Aldous Huxley or someother distopian thinker had heard of "social networking" they would realize that even their worst nightmares pale compared to the vision of the businesses in that space. The dream is a world where everyone is the same. They like the same music, have the same friends. The only exception are crafted "stars" cookie cutter beauties that act or sing in familiar and comfortable ways, calming, exciting, radical in turn, but alway familiar, always approved. We only see the news we want to see, only meet the people we want to meet, we can create a world where nothing is new, nothing is disturbing, where all information we see is perfectly controled.

The other night I saw a company that breathlessly bragged that they had developed software that allowed people to do the same thing as their friends, to surf the Web in the same way. Like lemmings marching together to the sea.

Here are some points:

• At 2/3 of your friends are overweight and half of those are obese.
• If you are in big city high-school to be like your friends you have to toss a coin, because 1/2 of them will drop out (in the US).
• People with the least diverse social networks have the worst immune response, so you will get up to 4 times as many colds.
• You will never hear bluegrass, new acoustic music, most jazz, modern orchestral music or the music of any other culture.
• You will think you like "all kinds of music" because what you have listened to or encountered is so limited.
• You will never learn another language, travel or even talk to anyone who has (if you are in the US).
• You can't locate Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran or Israel on a map (anywhere in the world)
• If your intelligence is higher than average, the majority of people in your social network and less intelligent that you.

The problems of the world have not all been solved. There are wars, there is poverty, threat of environmental problems and much more. It is up to each of us to do our part. I asked the authors of the software that allowed everyone to do what their friends were doing "who is this for?" If it sucks up the time of young people and creates a bubble for them so they do not learn about the world, it is not for them. The answer is: "it is for the authors of the social networking software to sell to marketing to get the kids to buy more stuff."

There is nothing wrong with this, but it seems it has a couple of interesting consequences.

It could negatively impact innovation. If everyone is doing the same things, then who will innovate? It is silly, of course, to think that everyone will march to the beat of the same drummer. There will always be people that are more motivated, less afraid and interested in doing something different. What is the benefit of having more of this?