Plenty of things to do, but having discovered Ultimate Handyman forum for instant help, nasty niffs are a thing of the past. “You need a Fernco Adaptor Connector!” Simples.
Another great forum is Online Conversions, devoted to converting units. I didn’t think this fascinating subject would be a great draw but even at midnight there were 693 users online. These people are walking computers. Provide them with an item, logs, crushed rock, sharp sand, for example, and they’ll calculate volumes, tell you whether it will damage the springs of your car and what size shed you need. Its success lies in the rise of buying things you can’t see online. Quantities are usually sold in kilograms and without knowing the density, you don’t know how much 1000 kg of sand look like. So you Google away and up comes Online Conversions.
Myspace seems to be having some kind of makeover. It was easy to use, you could define exactly how you wanted it to look, and I made two sites that were online art installations with minimal use of HTML in 06: Friction Fiction and The Hexyl Circle. It was literally My Space. A great idea. Then it became overloaded with adverts, it slowed, crashed, and was impossible to use. Very annoying if you spent time making it look good, and lots of people did. No surprise it’s being relaunched as My [___doh!].
Facebook is great, but it’s impossible to be an individual on Facebook. You have to fit in. To be “circulated” by the software requires understanding of the rules of Social Networking as defined by Facebook, ie You must update with products that Facebook sponsors otherwise you’re wasting your time on Facebook. For example, update with Harry Potter in your status and you’ll be circulated around the world far beyond your immediate circle of friends. And don’t forget to switch privacy off or Facebook will bury you. It’s an algorithm and it uses young peoples’ propensity for free product endorsement. Facebook took Social Networking and defined it online thus propagating their success. It lies in the simple formula that if you promote people who promote you, you’ll succeed. The problem for Facebook will be what happens when a generation grows up and wants to talk about tuition fees and unemployment instead of Xfactor and the jungle. Will Facebook change its winning formula? I doubt it.
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