Everyone's site

Places like MySpace and FaceBook are great places to get in trouble. Parents are getting in to the act after watching over the shoulders of their kids. I've noticed that many people have given up on chat software or instant messengers and now use the built in bits from MySpace or FaceBook to chat. That sucks for me because I haven't figured out how to get those devices to work in Linux yet.

There are huge movements in schools to teach online safety. We do not let Elle on a computer that has internet access yet. That will come. I need to find some nanny software that Nat and I feel comfortable with. I wonder if Elle will have me as a friend on her MySpace  (or whatever site is hot that week) page.

People really are using these sites to stay in touch. It is funny to watch folks use FaceBook to find out when their school chums are getting married. I've heard people say that sometimes folks won't announce big stuff until after it happened to avoid having to invite a bunch of people.

The Safe Haven group has attempted to use these sites to communicate, but only the truly geeky folks keep looking for updates. Most people log in once to put their name down and then check back every fifteen months whether they need to or not. These are the same people who would sign on to IM for three minutes to figure out who was on and then drop off, thus rendering the whole concept of IM useless.

There are still a bunch of people who will not read or return text messages. I have some people who bitch when I send them one because it costs them money. Old farts. (The one's I'm thinking of are younger than I.)

I fell in to the world of having one's own web page long before this whole do it for you craze came about. I had to learn how to put up my own server. It is not as easy. You have to leave a computer running. When it goes down, it is your fault. When you loose data, it is your fault. When you want more space, you go buy another hard drive. When you want to publish something you don't think others will like, you can because you own the hardware. You have complete say over who and what touches your site. So, it is give and take.