a couple rants

The first is a rant about MySpace and it will lead into the next one. I’m getting sick of MySpace for several reasons. Changing your own page’s design sucks! There is no reason that you should have to edit your site design by adding illegal(yes, you aren’t supposed to do it according to web standards) CSS tags into the “About Me:” section. That is kludgy and just wrong. It also doesn’t extend beyond your profile page. While on that line of thought, this is a major site that could really take advantage of Web 2.0 technologies and it still hasn’t 2 years after that movement became strong!
Having to log in for everything just irks me. Ok, I kinda get this one, but it still bugs me. I realize that for underage privacy stuff, they have to do it. But I’m sick of private profiles of people that I might know. I hit their page and its like, “do I recognize them in this pic or not?” I’m sorry people, privacy on the ‘net does not exist. Period. If you have something to say that you don’t want your mom to read, just don’t say it. It probably really ain’t worth it.

That leads to my second rant. Somehow I missed being friends with a certain crowd of people. The ones that interact with the web instead of just using it. Let me clarify. People that use the web just pass through. Emails and IMs just crossing it. Searching or reading, but rarely contributing. I only have 3 friends that I know of that blog regularly(trina and jackit, you guys rock!). My mom posts images to flikr regularly. Is my generation so luddite that they can’t even keep up with my mom!!! She’s still stuck in 5th and 6th grades!(Ok, so that’s a joke. She’s the teacher.) Stop just passing through the web making sure not to bump it. Feel it! Touch it! Move it! Shout and cause ripples! And just to clarify, MySpace doesn’t count. Hiding behind a “login required” wall does not count. That means you still haven’t interacted with the web, just a few friends that are allowed to see what you posted.

Just so that you know, I’m not suggesting this for minors. Well, maybe I am. But that’s only because I’d like to see the parents take an active role in showing their children how to use the web in a safe manner. If its public, then they can monitor what their kids are doing without any perception of invaded “privacy”. The internet is not the protected daycare. It’s a public park where they need taught the most basic of rules, “Don’t talk to strangers.”

I think that does it. Myspace needs redesigned, more friends of mine should create on the internet and kids should too.