The topic I want to talk about is concentrate on the new social network, Shaker, which put Facebook users to a wider stage to meet more friends they never see each other in the real world before but have the similar interest with them.
It is an amazing idea about the innovation in social network, people are trying to make more connections and interceptions between the social networks, or let us say the virtual world, and the real word. Facebook provides us a platform to achieve the Step 1, which is let us know more about the people around us, if you know their name and they have a Facebook account. But what if people who are shy and afraid of talking to strangers because of the culture shock or language problems? Is that means they cannot have any friends on Facebook or other social network? Shaker gave them the chances to make friends and meet different people.
Shaker uses the resources from Facebook and combined all the users in other social network like Second Life and The Sims; so the Shaker become like a big bar which you can choose to enter different rooms for different themes; choose your favorite music; interaction with other Facebook users, and even order a drink for another user. The Shaker comes up the idea that going to a bar but actually you do not go to the bar. More importantly, Shaker can put you into the room that is most suitable for you based on your personal file and what you post on Facebook or Twitter, what we called the key word. If you like Hip-Hop and you always use IPhone, at the same time you are in Syracuse University like physics; then the system will put you in to the room which suits those key words most. So when you join a room and start a conversation with other users you will never feel a kind of nervous or unfamiliar because everyone in the room has same interest. This idea definitely solve the problem of two strangers cannot find the common topic to talk about when they first meet and feel a kind of embarrassment.
But, the question is, do people want to meet friends in this way? Just know each other on the internet based on the common interest? I have asked dozens of friends around, most of them gave me negative responses, which indicate that most people, at least in US, do not want to make friends with some strangers before they meet each other in the real world. And more importantly, if you want to find a suitable room for yourself, you should share your personal profile and information; but based on the classes we had one week ago, always limit your personal information, or we can do a lot from Google or LinkedIn. One more problem, every user’s resource Shaker using now is from Facebook, what if Facebook decide not to provide the user’s profile anymore? Then the Shaker will loss all of its users because it operates based on the Facebook, it should come up with its own user crowd.
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