Academic

Social Networking as Discourse

By Rob Heverly

With everything that's been going on in relation to health care reform, there are debates everywhere. Some are interesting, some provide some good, basic information, while others are, well, ridiculous. In the midst of this, the blogosphere is going ballistic. And, in addition, so are the networking sites, in my case, Facebook. Which started me wondering.

One colleague of mine often posts links to articles regarding the health care debate and comments on them (I do this, as well), as well as on politics. One of his recent threads garnered 27 replies, and some of the discussion was quite good, but was also quite candid. My question is: are social networking sites really set up to be able to deal with this kind of thing? I've been trying to figure out why I even question this. Facebook has built-in capacity to allow comments; why not have policy and legal discussions within that "space"?

One reason is that Facebook buries posts on your page, even when they're active (it seems to sort by time, not activity). You can ask to be notified when someone posts on one of your posts or links, but it's not necessarily apparent to others who might like to read the discussion. There is also the notion that as a "closed" discussion, the input that the post might get is limited. Facebook is simply not made to do this, and we're "making" it do it, but maybe not to full effect.

But for me, I think the reason is the mix of personal and professional that exists in that space. I have a lot of "old" "friends" on Facebook, people that I knew in the wayback. I'm not sure of their jobs, their lives, their outlooks, their educations, and honestly I couldn't care less about those aspects for purposes of us staying in touch and having a conversation with me. They remember when my hair was long (it's now short), when my music was loud (it still often is, but not quite as often as it was), and when I was a geek (which I still am; witness this post). In addition, I have a lot of newer "friends" that I know primarily as a professional in my field (which is not health care, for example, or general politics). I might not know them well, but we've met, and spoken, and have shared interests. And responses to my links and posts appear in their news feeds.

So, are my "friends" interested in my diatribes? More importantly, are my colleague's friends interested in my diatribes, and are my friends interested in his? I enjoy these conversations, even when they get quite pointed, but they stand in stark contrast to the otherwise "friendly" nature of the site as a whole.

On further reflection, I think that's it. The people who can "talk" to me and to whom I can "talk" on Facebook are all on a list of "friends." And I don't usually have shouting matches with my friends. That said, I'm not sure I will stop discussing politics and law on Facebook. But maybe I also need to find my place in the blogosphere again (and bring my Facebook colleague with me).

Full post as published by The Faculty Lounge on August 14, 2009 (boomark / email).