Blog here, blog there, blog everywhere.

I just signed up at another online blog/profile site. I did this in order to leave a comment on a friend's blog that I found particularly interesting (Kudos to you Devi). My observation is that it is amazing how many of these sites now exist and the 'communities' that have developed around them. It is so easy to sign up and join a new network and connect to new 'friends'. I may be the only one who feels this way but it all seems just a little artificial. It’s not a real connection with a person; it’s a word transaction with whatever digitized picture that person has chosen to represent himself or herself with. I say this because there is no genuine emotion expressed through these sites, simply the exchange of news and superficial information. When is the last time you really helped someone through the myspace medium?

Personally, I just don't have time to keep up with all my online ‘friends’ lives. In his book the Tipping Point, author Malcolm Gladwell writes that you can only have a meaningful relationship with a community of about 150 people. Anymore than that, and sociologically we just can't keep up. As much as I love getting messages from people and reading what they write to me, if I don’t already have an established regular relationship with these people outside of myspace then it is too hard.

When I do have a relationship with the person that I am writing to then I think its great that we have this extra fun element to the way we communicate. Ultimately though I have a fear that myspace and the like is simply another distraction that keeps us from doing the things that we really need to. It is amazing how in the 20th century, the western world has consistently managed to find something trivial to fill its time with.

Oh well, I just saw a link about Madonna adopting an African child. I wonder what that is all about? I think I’ll check it out…