Facebook Groups
Posted by unluckydip | Filed under Media, Rant, Web, opinion
I’ve never been too much of a fan of social network sites but neither do I have any particular objection to them; that said I am rather fond of twitter. Facebook is the arguably the largest social network site online at the current time, and I myself am a member. The main reason for this membership is that Facebook does seem to be the easiest way to contact real-world friends online; e-mail for personal communication appears to be all but dead. People use Facebook for all sorts of reasons, mine is basically a communication tool for people I actually know, and its also in someways a bit of a blog.
Anyway, the one thing that has always annoyed me with Facebook is the prevalence of the Facebook group. These groups allow people that are not “friends” with each other on the site the ability to communicate with each other in a mini-forum based on a shared topic of interest. These groups generally to fall in two categories: Banal Statements or Extreme Views. The Banal, for example: “Can this sausage roll get more fans than Cheryl Cole”, can get tiresome but are bearable, and then their are extreme groups such as “Bring back the hangman for acts of terrorism, treason, murder, paedophilia” and “Lock Jon Venables up for Life and Throw Away the Key”. The posts on the pages are just are no more charming than the titles themselves, for example one person wrote on the latter group:
“kill the bastard very slowly so he can feel the pain that little boy felt when he didnt give a fuck what he and his mate was doing to poor james, torchure the bastards and then kill them slowly causing them every bit of pain possible like they caused james let the public know the new names, see how long they last on the streets rip james they will get what they derserve evenually”
The most shocking thing about Facebook is not that these groups exist, but its finding out how many of your friends hold these sort of views and are actively trying to recruit others to join. I’m of course not saying that people shouldn’t be able to have a debate on such topics as capital punishment but the prevalence of extreme views on Facebook is startling; and this isn’t something that is a new phenomenon to Facebook, I remember discussing it a few years ago with my sixth-form sociology teacher.
Last week I read a opinion piece in the Guardian making this sort of point and it was this prompted me to write this little rambling piece, but its certainly worth mentioning. I recommend you have a little look at the article; because from what I can see, on the whole, itsn’t too face from the truth “Facebook groups are the new lynch mobs: These reactionary campaigners confuse the concept of ‘justice’ with ‘vigilante vengeance’”
Tags: Banal, blog, Cheryl Cole, Daily Mail, Extreme, Facebook, Groups, Jon Venables, opinion, Social networks, Twitter
Written without Review.
Posted by unluckydip | Filed under Media, Rant, blog, blogging, opinion
Despite loving blogs, blogging and the blogosphere there are two things that often hold me back posting , if they didn’t there would be many more posts on this site.
Firstly, Self-Review. I think small blogs; such as this one, work better when people write there opinions in a bit of a rant form and instantly post the result. However, I will often find myself reviewing my posts over and over again and as a result watering them down. Now, I know this is not necessarily bad practice, but it often leads to me not posting things that may be of interest. The reason I trash these posts leads onto point two (in essence there both interrelated)
Secondly, Knowledge. I often scrap posts due to many of them not being readily linkable to anything to support them; as is the nature of ranting. This again is not necessarily a bad thing because sometimes blogs; particularly small blogs, work due to their scattergun approach. The majority of online communication encourages us to be spontaneous and to think and interact without thought… and while this does lead to some interesting content it should not dominate the intellectual exchange of ideas between individuals online. If it does the legitimacy of new media as a source of information could be undermined. There should be a happy balance between the two. Which I try and aim for.
So, as I’ve said before I’m going to add a disclaimer somewhere on this blog that states that some of the content on this blog is my opinion only… or something along those lines. And hopefully as a a result I will start posting some more interesting “off the cuff” posts, that is not to say they will dominate.
But what does seem to dominate on here is youtube videos, and that isn’t gonna change with this post. Here are a couple of comedy clips regarding the opinions of the public both in old and new media.
Tags: blog, blogging, New Media, Posting, Self-Review
Take A Weird Break
Posted by unluckydip | Filed under Uncategorized
I really dislike those real life story magazines such as take a break, that’s life and real lives to name but a few of the top of my head.
I realise it’s not “original” to slate these magazines, as I’m sure the vast majority of people; I’d hope, can see it’s nothing more than an accumulation of complete and utter bollocks.
I find myself flick through these magazines on an irregular when I’m in the staffroom at work because many of the female members of staff can’t seem to get enough of them. Often I end up getting as angry as a typical Daily Mail reader with the pure putrid garbage I see contained within them, often to much amusement to the people around me. A typical rant will see me reading the headlines such as “I Breastfeed My Dog to stop her barking” followed by me saying something along the lines of “Well, That’s Life!” “Stabbed for a Peanut”, “Well, That’s Life!”
There is a great blog called Take A Weird Break which documents some of the weirdest headlines from these magazines and I recommend you take a look because while they annoys me, it is rather entertaining to see them.
One of the posts on the blog; now hidden on a page deep into the blog, someone who once worked for one of these magazines writes a letter regarding reader submitted photos, here’s an extract to leave you with:
Every day I’d have about 100 envelopes to open, and quite literally, 10 of these each day were pictures of dogs wearing sunglasses. For some reason every TAB reader thought this was the funniest thing in the world, and they ALL suggested the following caption:
“Here’s Rover, making a spectacle of himself!!!!”
Tags: blog, Breastfeed, Daily Mail, Dog, Glasses, Magazines, Peanut, Stabbed, take a break, That's Life, Web, Weird
Twitter Update Post
Posted by unluckydip | Filed under Web, blog
I must apologise for that horrendous twitter update post, I’ve only just seen it.
It initially seems like a great idea to have a weekly round-up of your tweets as a blogpost, but it just doesn’t work in practice. If you’d like to see my twitter updates feel free to go to my twitter page: Twitter.com/unluckydip. It’s mostly banal statements held together with the occasional gem and sometimes the odd interesting retweet.
Having seen the weekly update post I’m scrapping it immediately, I may very well setup something to go in its place; which should be of at least some use, soon.
Tags: Automatic, Awful, blog, Retweet, Tweet, Twitter, update, Wordpress
Return of the blog!
Posted by unluckydip | Filed under blogging
This morning/afternoon I’ve finally got round to making a few changes to my blog, and this will probably continue for the next couple of days as I finally get back into keeping my blog updated.
Tags: blog, blogging, Reading, Review, Science, Test, University
A New Year (14 days late)
Posted by unluckydip | Filed under Personal, blog, video
Ok, So we’ve been in 2010 for 14 days now so this is a bit late, but HAPPY NEW YEAR and all that.
I’ve decided I’m gonna start blogging more often, I do enjoy it but I’m too conscious of what I’m posting, unlike on twitter. So some of the things on here, from now on, maybe more off the cuff or mundane or nothing more than pure conjecture on my part amongst the usual style of structured arguments/opinions and items of interest pulled from the various corners of the web; speaking of which I’m gonna leave you with two videos at the end of this post.
In the next few days I’m gonna make a new page tab which is basically gonna be a disclaimer that not everything on this page is to be taken at face value necessarily, or something along those lines. Anyway, I’m gonna top my glass up with some more port and post two videos that I’ve probably posted before, both rather different from each other, but both of interest to me, and hopefully yourself.
Tags: 2010, bill hicks, blog, changes, disclaimer, genre, Humour, Movie, New year, video
