Web 2.0 is a piece of shite

The first "blog" I ever read was Bob C Cock's weekly rant. So early on was it that logging onto the net involved listening to facsimile noises and people were talking about the 'information superhighway' instead of that 50 lane highway from mexico to canadia.
Anyway I distinctly remember this post of which I snippeted the following social commentary:

Chat rooms on AOL rule as well. Complete gender mind probe. What other popular medium allows a person to switch genders and role play. You can bet that if you are engaged in a hot n nasty conversation with a "19 year old nymphet who is curious about anal sex" that this person is in fact a 48 year old, overweight guy named Steve who has just ejaculated on his floor for the 30th time that day, thus creating an embarrassing stain on the carpet that he tells his wife is actually a bowl of Ben and Jerry's Phish Food that he spilled last night while getting the score of the Giants/Bears game on Sportsnet. The wife, of course feigns belief in his pathetic story because she is being extremely cautious not to pressure him too hard about his late night Internet activities due to the fact that her inquires might inspire a backlash from her chubby hubby, which would then result in an investigation of his own concerning her "daytime while he is working Internet fun time", that would then clearly reveal that she has been indeed spending far more time on AOL than him and has in fact developed a relationship with "DOMin8her" from New Jersey that has lasted for three years now and even progressed to the no tell motel stage where she has been "forced" to perform what her "daddy" calls bathroom training, which is nothing more than her shitting into a cat litter box while he masturbates. She tells her friends that she is excited by the Internet because of all these neat recipes she's finding on marthstewart.com and now her fat husband Steve can get his sports scores instantly, but the sad truth really is they both think of the net constantly in a weird, creepy sexual way and have come to rely on it heavily to create some semblance of excitement in their routine filled lives and they both have forgotten why they got married in the first place and she, in fits of guilt and depression, is debating whether to call Dr. Laura for advice.

What a blast from the past. Sometimes I forget that the internet occurred on my watch much like my parents witnessed the dawn of colour television.

In fact I think my folks still had a black and white tv well into the 80's.

Anyway, wanting to be magnanimously clever I decided to have an esoteric birthday party this year as arranged through facebook.

Simply put instead of throwing a party, I sent out invites to inform people I wasn't throwing a party, and implored them to go out and enjoy themselves with close friends.

Interestingly nobody has invited me out friday night. More interestingly is that 13 people listed themselves as 'maybe attending' and 26 people are not attending.

It makes me worry that the 25 people who are attending are going to call me late on Friday night to ask for directions and I have to explain to them that there is no actual party.

But to me the real payload is that it confirms what I have known for years to be true but never been able to prove. Facebook, online advertising, online marketing and all of that is an overhyped piece of shit.

Even bryce, probably the most effective online promoter I know, I can't say from my observation has not had runaway success with it.

The fact that people RSVP as maybe attending a party that you can't not attend by definition indicates that people don't really read any of these invites at all. That they RSVP maybe which is really a polite way of saying 'no' and 'no' is the equivalent of ignoring something in any other facebook application.

Most email's in my facebook inbox are for comedy performances, theater shows, rally's and band gigs that in most cases I will never attend.

Facebook and myspace and the internet in general is yet to deliver any indication that such a highly competitive medium can deliver anybody real fame and wealth.

It has merely made junk mailers of us all. Everybody has an agenda that we all wildly fantasize will take off and produce big results.

Just like Jamie's "Ministry of Food" fantasy, his "pass it on" theory, that people will week after week teach recipes to people who will then teach others recipes, and so on and so fourth until the whole city can cook is ambitious to say the least.

I imagine he has the media clout and resources to shift attitudes, but its hard to get people to turn up to something they love week after week after week let alone get enthused about teaching neighbors to cook.

An idea lives and dies on its merits, not its advertising. It's not to say promotion isn't important, its just that at best really great effective promotion can turn a dud idea into a fad. Only a good idea will generally last.