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Google UX Researcher Explains the Social Networking Gay Bar Problem

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Re: Google UX Researcher Explains the Social Networking Gay Bar Problem

#51

Post by joe_the_user »

I think he is simply wrong that web is only going to get more and more social.

I would posit that an opposite movement will also happen. Social networks become more ubiquitous but that very ubiquity will teach people what not to share and raise the value of the "anonymous web".

For example, if a merchant can understand their customers exactly, it introduces an information asymmetry into the market game that the merchant enjoys but I, as customer dislike. I don't want a merchant to know exactly what I'd be willing to pay for X. I want the merchant offering prices anonymously and then for me to be able to pick the best of those prices.

Re: Google UX Researcher Explains the Social Networking Gay Bar Problem

#52

Post by joe_the_user »

grandalf wrote: post #45
robryan wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty much what ycombinator funded "the fridge" tries to achieve. The problem is the best tool is probably a hybrid between full segregation and full connectedness. Problem is that in this kind of territory your application becomes harder for the user who has to think more about who is going to see which piece of content.

Is it really that hard? Why not just let me check the box near "high school" and uncheck the box near "parents' friends"... Anyone who isn't naive about the implications of a "like" or a comment or a photo in everyone else's news feed will think twice about whether to post at all, which I'd argue uses more cognitive energy than simply opting in the correct group of friends to receive the information.

I have to say that any application intended to allow people to manage, say, four intersecting sets of items of any sort is going to back rather hard to use, unless someone has come with some incredibly clever UI metaphors I don't know about.

Will there be four (or five) checkboxes next to every normal action? It would seem to complicate things by a few orders of magnitude. Remember adding elements is often a multiplicative rather than an additive affair - just adding a few extra checkboxes to a given page can take it from clear to "head-spinning".

Re: Google UX Researcher Explains the Social Networking Gay Bar Problem

#53

Post by kenjackson »

grandalf wrote: post #45
robryan wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty much what ycombinator funded "the fridge" tries to achieve. The problem is the best tool is probably a hybrid between full segregation and full connectedness. Problem is that in this kind of territory your application becomes harder for the user who has to think more about who is going to see which piece of content.

Is it really that hard? Why not just let me check the box near "high school" and uncheck the box near "parents' friends"... Anyone who isn't naive about the implications of a "like" or a comment or a photo in everyone else's news feed will think twice about whether to post at all, which I'd argue uses more cognitive energy than simply opting in the correct group of friends to receive the information.

Is it really that hard?

Actually it is. Think about how few people actually categorize people in their IM client, or bookmarks, or virtually any other service.

There are a couple of ways to try to deal with this:

1) Put the onus on the contactor to specify the relationship. This is what LinkedIn does.

2) Actually have several different mechanisms that users can use. I really like free form tagging. I'd like to be able to send status and then have a tag field where I just list the tags of the various groups I want to send this status update to.

The oddly nice thing about how Facebook does it today though is that since everyone is so used to getting random weird status updates, no one cares. Imagine if you got an email from a friend that said, "Eating pie, watching Glee. Bored, might go to sleep early." You'd be like, "WFT? Is this guy gonna kill himself or something? Why did he send me this?" But on Facebook, you don't even notice. Heck you might even say, "Yeah, Glee is kind of weak in season 2".

I don't know. How people interact on the internet is weird.

Re: Google UX Researcher Explains the Social Networking Gay Bar Problem

#54

Post by pjscott »

I like how pseudonymity works: you go by one or more pseudonyms, on various web sites. It lets you have multiple identities, and figuring out which identities are the same person is non-trivial. It's an easy hack. You can post your erotic furry artwork under one identity, use another professionally, another with your friends, and everything will be more or less okay.

Alternately, maybe people will get used to lack of privacy, and acknowledge that everyone has more than one group of acquaintances, and that information on the web is permanent even if people themselves change. You'll know this is happening when someone finds naked pictures of a female teacher on the Internet and she doesn't get fired. I'm not holding my breath, though.

Re: Google UX Researcher Explains the Social Networking Gay Bar Problem

#55

Post by wtracy »

three14 wrote: post #7

Has anyone made an effort yet to do the evident thing, and simply build a social service that lets you have separate groups of friends for all features?

There are sites that addresses this by creating completely independent social networks for separate interests. This seems to actually work for certain sensitive topics (look up "FetLife" for an example).

Re: Google UX Researcher Explains the Social Networking Gay Bar Problem

#56

Post by wolfrom »

three14 wrote: post #7

Has anyone made an effort yet to do the evident thing, and simply build a social service that lets you have separate groups of friends for all features?

We're working on exactly that issue for our product (Windsoc). We're working on algorithms that attempt to create social circles, while providing an interface that should make manual adjustment and categorization easy. When someone posts using our service, they'll be able to select specific circles of contacts, or even individuals, to Facebook or other services.

I've noticed that people have started to give up on the idea of contact management across services, which is usually a good indication that it's the perfect time to make it happen.

(If anyone is curious, we'll be starting private beta in December.)

Re: Google UX Researcher Explains the Social Networking Gay Bar Problem

#57

Post by sfphotoarts »

wolfrom wrote: post #56
three14 wrote: post #7

Has anyone made an effort yet to do the evident thing, and simply build a social service that lets you have separate groups of friends for all features?

We're working on exactly that issue for our product (Windsoc). We're working on algorithms that attempt to create social circles, while providing an interface that should make manual adjustment and categorization easy. When someone posts using our service, they'll be able to select specific circles of contacts, or even individuals, to Facebook or other services. I've noticed that people have started to give up on the…

There used to be a tcp/ip stack called winsock. Thanks for the memory.

The d was silent for me when I read that sentence.

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