staying.cool

facebook beckons, but knowing that facebook is moving in the direction of loading its pages with adwords.. and that there is a possibility that some guy can definitely read everything i put up there (regardless of what permissions i set), is just a little scary.

orkut doesn’t have as much detail, but could already be there.

very scary.

as much as i’ve drifted off orkut, orkut has drifted offa me.

a week, and zero scraps/messages. peace.

no, i’ve not deleted my profile.

confession: i have lost all interest in orkut as a social networking tool.
i rarely ever scrap, i don’t update my album, i don’t randomly surf profiles, i don’t compulsively check the damn site for people scrapping me, i forget to even check the ‘label’ under which it is archived - in short, i find it boring.

facebook, on the other hand, looks interesting. the few times i have browsed using a friends’, its looked pretty involving. the status updates, and the heightened level of interaction make it look pretty neat. this could always simply be that it is different from orkut - i remember going crazy over orkut 6 months ago.

i’m just not sure it is worth the effort on facebook. set it up, add people, message people, check the site, update status.. repeat last 3 steps. somehow social networking seems pretty valueless today. its a classic waste of time and doesn’t even give you the satisfaction of being entertained at the end of it.

or am i just apathetic right now ?

post mumbai nilaa, the almighty sena takes on orkut. yes, orkut is bad. we as a people do not have the mental capacity to differentiate between crap about shivaji, and crap in general.

i foresee a repeat of google china. ah, zis is indya after all.

it has been a while since i went off on a loop about the crappy forwards that people seem to keep want sending on orkut. somehow the method of copy-paste & send message to ‘all’ has some kind of weird attraction for so many people out there. why, indeed, they want to broadcast stupidity.. is a little beyond me.

the latest from orkut:

Because u have read this.. u will get kissed on the nearest possible friday by the LOVE of ur life if u don’t break the chain. tomorrow will be the best day of ur life. However, if u don’t send this to at least 10 people by the stroke of midnight tonight u will be forever cursed in LOVE.

and of course:

Finally,its out…its your ORKUT CRUSH LIST FINDER.Download here and send it to everybody before midnite or something bad will happen to your near ones. [insert probable virus download link]

before, i do start on my raving about the monumental stupidity of the above emails, not to mention the obviously irritating structure and punctuation.. i’m going to take a minute. and offer a prayer that the reproductive systems of these people shut down at such time as appropriate. i could not imagine these genes spreading… and becoming dominant. a worthy nightmare.

i still remember picturing when i read the first email… walking down the street/corridor, and suddenly the person you’ve been secretly admiring for months - never mind the obvious problems such as them being rich, famous, inaccessible, married, way above your league, way below your league - turn up right there in front of you. and kiss you. right there and then. and you, mentally bless the day you forwarded that email to everyone you know. because, obviously, there is no other way you could have got it “made”. my only question, was ‘why friday ?’ sunday is too relaxed ? tuesday is too-middle-of-the-week ?
the thought comes to me that ‘10′ seems to have a relation to the possibility of a curse. i wonder why. isn’t ‘6′ something to do with the devil ? and ‘13′ unlucky ? somehow, the mutual curses of 10 people (or in my case at least 1), will offset the curse that could potentially befall you ?
email count: over 30.

the ‘crush list finder’.. well, i’ve analysed the various forms of the crush list. i’m just curious about what kind of virus it is. and of course, how many people remembered they’re giving their email account and password to some random software. and what it did. and who the genius was that came up with it. plus of course the meaning of the answer of ‘42′.

which i’ll remain wondering about…

after reading this, a question that has been hovering at the back of my head begs analysis.

i’ve spoken about it before as well, and even if i have been disparaging about the reaction of people to a lot of the mails i have received, some current developments mean second thoughts should be had. if not third.

orkut is, and always has been very open in terms of structure: everyone finds everyone, meets anyone, can read about anyone, can add anyone. the concept was that you would not invite someone you do not know to orkut. however, making gmail - and hence orkut - available to anyone kinda kicks that idea in the teeth. orkut is not the “trusted circle” of friends they call themselves anymore. the effect is already seen - fake profiles are created for every possible misuse - whether slander, paedophilia, or just a misguided sense of fun.
scraps are literally meant to be ’scraps’: pointless tid-bits. and should be used that way. people misuse them, talk about everyone on them - there will be consequences to acting thoughtlessly. i think orkut scraps were designed to be quick ‘hey-how-are-you’ messages, not personal ads. or long messages about the self. are we still worried about the content being publicly accessible? delete all scraps. i have nearly 2000, would keeping them help me? i think not. deleted.
how restrictive is orkut when it comes to details ? you can choose who can see what, some generic details are open to all. those details, i should think, are pretty common. or obvious. religion, language, books, music.. these are shared by a wide majority. i see now that ‘google talk id’ is common knowledge - i.e. can be seen by everyone - which is stupid. can i change that ? only if i disable google talk+orkut. which is pointless integration i have come to believe. disabled.
i’m not saying that these are the only issues, there are more which i may be skipping over. when they do occur to me, there will be updates. the point is that this source of possible privacy breach can be controlled to some extent.

now, for the question of whether its safe at all. there are two parts to it. the first depends on what level i stop at for restricting privacy. the second is pertaining to how far misuse by a third party affects me.