Social networking for you but not me

The Economist looks at social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook. For a long time, I mistook MySpace for MSN Spaces (after a short stint on SixDegrees in the 90s, I gave up on social networking sites, since I’m not that sociable) — yes, not very with-it, am I. The only reason I have an account on Friendster is because one of my classmates from Uni sent me an invite a while back. Oh, and I also have an account on LinkedIn, which has connected me to some former colleagues, so that’s pretty handy.

I guess I’ve stuck myself in the old school. I think these sites are good for communicating with people you know in real life but had lost touch with, yet I’m definitely not so keen on putting so much personal information on a third party site for other people to find.

• 15 Sep 2006