International Law

Is MySpace good for society?

A special Freakonomics Quorum asks is MySpace good for society?

Two little words ? ?social networking? ? have become a giant buzzphrase over the past couple of years, what with the worldwide march of Facebook and headline-ready stories about Web-assisted suicides. So what?s the net effect of social networking?

We gathered a group of wise people who spend their days thinking about this issue ? Martin Baily, Danah Boyd, Steve Chazin, Judith Donath, Nicole Ellison, and William Reader, ? and asked them this question:

Has social networking technology (blog-friendly phones, Facebook, Twitter, etc.) made us better or worse off as a society, either from an economic, psychological, or sociological perspective?

Here are their replies.

Read the responses here.

Full post as published by Freedom to Differ on February 16, 2008 (boomark / email).