'Social graph-iti'

As our group project is identity online I wanted to find out why people are using networking sites like Myspace/Facebook etc at what is good/bad about these networks. I know why I’m using Myspace: I can send messages to friends who are living in other countries, I can see how they look like now, I can send pictures to them etc.. so it's in a way help to keep the friendship more update and fresh. And I just speak with people who I know!!
What I don't like is when random people are sending me messages and videos or try to hack my myspace, as it happened with me last week...I don't understand why someone is doing that!!!Personally I don't put on too many personal details on Myspace as my friends already know me. And we also need to be careful how much personal info we let strangers know about us!! I have been reading loads of articles about people who fall victim of identity theft as they giving out their birth place and date, full name etc.. online. I put on a good article about this, the title is: A fresh identity is stolen every four seconds
So this is definitely the dark side of networking!!

But why people like these sites and why are they useful??

An article published in The Economist (18. 10. 2007) tries to find the answer for: why facebook is a ‘masterstroke’? It says that one of the reason is its “mini-feed”, this is ‘an event stream on users pages that keeps users abreast of what their friends are doing-uploading photos, adding a widget and so on’. The article also describes how people are getting addicted to 'spy' on their friends. I found this absolutely true and freaky at the same time..Why we like checking on our friends????

Jerry Michalski, a consultant, calls the mini-feed a “data exhaust” that gives Facebook users “better peripheral vision” into the lives of people they know only casually. This mini-feed is so far the clearest example of using the social graph in a concrete way.’

They also talk about the future of these social networks: as not one big social graph but instead a 'myriad small communities on the internet to replicate the millions that exist offline’. Paul Saffo, a Silicon Valley forecaster said in this article:

'unlike other networks, social networks lose value once they go beyond a certain size....The value of a social network is defined not only by who's on it, but by who's excluded' (The Economist 18/10/2007)

So certain people, identities are excluded from these networks: as there are already networks like "aSmallWorld" that is just for rich and famous people!!!