Piaras Kelly PR - Public Relations in Ireland

I’ve put off Facebook for a while, but since joining two months ago I’ve gradually gotten hooked. The interesting thing is though is that the social networking aspect of Facebook isn’t what’s drawing me back, it’s the applications. I’ve signed up for Twitter, Premiership Picks, Tetris and a couple of others. I’m also pulling in my blog feed and del.icio.us bookmarks through my profile. What I’ve realised is that Facebook is a great information management tool and points to the future of the web in my opinion.

What I’m observing on the internet is the evolution from information search to information management. The Internet started off as the information superhighway. The problem was that it was so vast that you needed Google to navigate it. What’s happening now is that there is so much to balance between RSS feeds, social networking accounts, etc. The problem is that are so many applications that compete for your attention.

I like Facebook because it can pull in a number of applications that compete for my time so that I can manage all the information I have to process easier. It’s not just the likes of Facebook that have realised this, just log onto Google and there is a range of options running along the upper toolbar.

If you look at one trend that holds true across industries is convergence. People made the transition from CD players to mp3 players because it made much more sense to walk around with a device like an iPod instead of a Discman with hundreds of CDs. In much the same way some Internet surfers turned to RSS instead of logging onto hundreds of websites everyday. So whoever figures out how to simplify my experience online will get my undivided attention (so they can direct ads at me :D)