I thought I would share with you an interesting conversation I had with Cat yesterday. It would appear that Cat caved into peer pressure an has created a My Space account. Her office mates all have one and have urged her to get one. Personally, I have never seen My Space and only looked at it for the first time last evening when Cat wanted to show me hers. Overall, I think I have generally been against My Space because every story I have ever heard about it ends with some 14 year old girl getting raped by a pedophile.
Anyway, after seeing Cat's account and several others (apparently many Goucher folks from our class have accounts), I came away largely unimpressed. Cat then asked me, "Why don't you like it? What is the difference between My Space and your blog?" My response was, " 14 year old girls don't get raped on my blog!" I am proud that we can boast that as a key selling point for the Egypt 6 Circle of Blogging.
My Blog vs. My Space...
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
The key here is quality control. Egypt 6 has three members, all handpicked to maximize quality. While we have had many offers to expand the group, we have unanimously opposed all of them. And so we maintain the same relevance and quality that we had at the beginning.
Myspace, on the other hand, invites anyone and everyone to just come on board. Finding quality posts, then, becomes an exercise in futility. Plus, why is everyone on that site friends with some guy named Tom? A little creepy if you ask me. It's like a cult.
Let's check out some horrible Myspace pages. :D
http://www.myspace.com/ruthreznor
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=2961041
http://www.myspace.com/rainbow_luver
Finally, let's take a look at Myspace's Terms of Service. I call your attention to the following:
"By displaying or publishing ("posting") any Content, messages, text, files, images, photos, video, sounds, profiles, works of authorship, or any other materials (collectively, "Content") on or through the Services, you hereby grant to MySpace.com, a non-exclusive, fully-paid and royalty-free, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense through unlimited levels of sublicensees) to use, copy, modify, adapt, translate, publicly perform, publicly display, store, reproduce, transmit, and distribute such Content on and through the Services. This license will terminate at the time you remove such Content from the Services. You represent and warrant that: (i) you own the Content posted by you on or through the Services or otherwise have the right to grant the license set forth in this section, and (ii) the posting of your Content on or through the Services does not violate the privacy rights, publicity rights, copyrights, contract rights or any other rights of any person. You agree to pay for all royalties, fees, and any other monies owing any person by reason of any Content posted by you to or through the Services."
Be careful what you post on Myspace!
I am not surprised by the terms of service, but they still upset me nonetheless. I will need to warn Cat about the content that is put up there. Right now I think there are just some wedding photos and pictures of Griffey, but I don't even believe they should be up there. I just hate My Space!
For a brief moment, I considered having us try to create the worst looking My Space accounts possible. Mostly based on the music choices of the three accounts that you linked above. I was thinking maybe I could have some "Snow," A.K.A. "The Fakin' Jamaican" in the background and... well... I don't know. I just don't think I can create anything that horrible.
Anyway, regarding the closed nature of our blog, I agree it maintains a degree of quality control, however it does not necessarily imply that those who have offered to contribute to the blog will provide content that is of poor quality.
That having been said, one of the 4 known non-contributors that view the blog, we will call him "Andy M", sent me an email commenting on my concerns about My Space. Here is his comment below:
---------------
"14 year old girls and your blog"
I am sending you this email since you have closed comments on your blog, and it is in fact because of that fact that I’m writing in the first place! See, with closed comments, you can’t really know that your blog hasn’t contributed to the rape of 14 year old girls. There could be literally thousands of 14 year olds who would be commenting and letting you know, only you have “cleverly” removed that ability. I smell a trap.
Now my blog has definitely not contributed to the rape of 14 year old girls,
"Andy M"
------------------
I somehow doubt I am opening a Pandora's box by posting Andy's comment, but I thought it would be fun to share his opinion. I also maintain that our site has NOT contributed to the rape of anyone, let alone 14 year old girls.
I would counter to Andy that just because people have the ability to comment on his blog does not mean that there aren't people too fearful to come forward, if in fact his blog contributed to their rape. Again, this is all baseless and the argument does not correlate. I do appreciate having a guest protagonist come and visit every now and then.
Thank you Andy and Thank you My Space.
re: making the worst Myspace page.
I am pretty sure, Joe, that your intellectual mind couldn't come up with anything worse than some of the ones I've seen. You don't know what teenage girls are capable of, man. It's a scary world out there.
re: quality control.
You're right, and I didn't mean to imply that those individuals out there who do not post on the blog are somehow unworthy of it.
Now I'm questioning the closed nature of the blog, and whether it is helping us or hurting us. However, that's a topic for another day.
Post a Comment