Wednesday, May 18, 2011

What's his face- Mark Zuckerberg a.k.a Frankenstein


After watching The Social Network, I wanted to know more about Mark Zuckerberg. I went to Wikipedia, which factually more or less confirmed what was mentioned in the movie. I watched an interview of his on YouTube, in which he came across as very different from his movie persona.

As I was multi-tasking while listening to the interview, I stopped paying attention to what Mark Zuckerberg was saying after a while. A comment by the interviewer stayed with me though. He said that Facebook seemed to enroach on our privacy as a default, only stepping back and raising its hands when it was obvious that it had gone too far.

That seemed to check out with the movie's portrayal of Facebook's founder too. Sometimes I think that privacy on Facebook is oxymoronic. If we wanted privacy, we wouldn't be on Facebook. I think Facebook is breaking new ground because it is media that is personal and social. Unlike books, radio, TV, internet.

Maybe that's why we spend more time on it. It's our filter for other media. Will the collective consciousness improve? Will we know more, read better articles, watch more educational videos as they are shared by our more learned friends?

Or will we click on titillating links, treat Facebook like our personal idiot box? Will there be a mass dumbing down? We still don't know what Facebook is, can, or will be. It evolves constantly, and we evolve with it.

It is truly two way media. Often we find it's intuitive, easier to use. Another part of Mark Zuckerberg's interview stayed with me. This 27 year old asked high school kids what email they used.

They thought email's slow. I too find it cumbersome nowadays to type out a subject line and text. It's just easier to keep others in the loop by writing on one friend's wall on Facebook. I also watched some hilarious videos of Facebook in the offline world. People poking each other actually, writing on wall, and shouting out comments.

We write about the real world online. It's still funny to imagine the virtual world offline. Maybe one day it will be the other way round.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

Wonderfully written. The last two lines really have a lot for a reader to take back home.

Sneha Banerjee said...

 A good blog with a tinge of humour. Loved reading it.:)

nupurmaskara said...

 @facebook-100000916590340:disqus @c897734d7b1a5d7e23f1fe578e4a9db3:disqus thanks guys :)