"It's weird being able to use a mouse on my tummy!"

[reddragdiva]

• How to do a decent web comic.

• "A stupid person is a person who causes losses to another person or to a group of persons while himself deriving no gain and even possibly incurring losses ... Stupid people are dangerous and damaging because reasonable people find it difficult to imagine and understand unreasonable behaviour."

• The VNV Matrix and the nation of Sweden.

• I can't help think of hirez. And his sack of hammers.

• Browser sniffing explained. (And yep - still 1995.)

• "Supernodes are less likely to join."

It's another quiet weekend in! (I need an icon for domesticity.) We were having vatine over for vidyers, but redcountess has been very unwell this weekend and unable to receive visitors. Though arkady has come over this evening and is making apple pastries as I write this. In between watching the hours of documentaries on the four-disc Fellowship Of The Ring with Liz. I have just made a marvellous spaghetti Bolognaise.

We were hoping to catch up with serpentstar, but too little cash even for bus fare, combined with the weather, put paid to that. I am so looking forward to being paid Tuesday.

Comments

[owdbetts.livejournal.com]

"Supernodes are less likely to join."

Presuambly supernodes are defined as people whose friends lists are so big LJ is unable to display them :-)

-roy

[reddragdiva]

And I actually do read the whole thing! Not every day, but quite frequently!

The point of the internet is, of course, to get laid enhance one's social network. However, software for this purpose must have some other point to it. You don't care about your friends' friends' friends unless they somehow show themselves to be of interest to you, e.g. good writing, and you have some opening to show yourself of interest, e.g. posting comments. And if you tend towards knowing everyone, you do need a context in which to know them.

[loosechanj.livejournal.com]

Speaking of social networks, where in the 'net did you find grumpy_sysadmin?

[reddragdiva]

On jwz, IIRC. Grumpy?

Grumpy?

[loosechanj.livejournal.com]

I try to be.

[grumpy-sysadmin.livejournal.com]

Here (http://www.livejournal.com/users/jwz/friendsfriends), probably.

(Or vice versa. As in, I added you as a friend based on it.)

It's not impossible it had to do with someone clicking on one of their own interests, but I doubt it.

[owdbetts.livejournal.com]

And I actually do read the whole thing! Not every day, but quite frequently!

That's just scary... :-)

-roy

[reddragdiva]

And on the Friendster-type services, I've never gone further than being a leaf node. Because there is no other apparent purpose or intrinsic structure. (Unlike, e.g., Usenet, IRC or LiveJournal.)

[rosefox]

Like me? *)

I'm on Friendster, and have actually used it: to find old friends, not to make new ones. As with LJ, I set up shop and then let other people come find me. It seems to have worked pretty well, but I agree that without more active participation from the "supernodes", it doesn't do much good for the people who aren't.

On the flip side, if there were a "connections needed" LJ community, I'd be an avid reader and probably semi-frequent poster. Need someone to fix your artcar in Connecticut, sell your funny bumper stickers in Texas, or discuss microbiology in London? No problem; I know all those people, I can set you up. But you have to ask. The value of supernodes is that once we are approached with a question, we can generally give you an answer in the form of some useful person who possesses the needed qualities. "I wanna get laid" isn't sufficient information, which is why IMO Friendster is really basically useless for all but the least picky. "I wanna meet a nice Jewish boy who's into psychology and funny music and happens to be polyamorous and in the northeastern U.S.", now, that I can arrange, no problem.

[kraant.livejournal.com]

Well,

What are you waiting for?

Start the comminity.

[rosefox]

One of these years, I may. *) I just need to take the time to look around first and see whether anyone's already doing it.

[kraant.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't neccesarily argue that. I'm only good friends with a dozen people or so. But between those people I have 2-3 degrees of seperation to almost everyone I'd want to know in Melbourne.

[reddragdiva]

This came up on a Netizen list a few years ago. As well as the social supernodes, you have metanodes - who aren't supernodes themselves, but seem to know really quite a few of them. Perhaps you're there.

Do your two to three degrees of separation tend to go through a lot of the same routes?

[kraant.livejournal.com]

Most connections are second degree ones through one of half a dozen people.

Domesticity

[loosechanj.livejournal.com]

Might I suggest having your photo taken whilst dressed as a french maid? Or is that just too cliche?

Re: Domesticity

[reddragdiva]

The hard part being, of course, something that will work in 100x100 pixels.

[barbedwirekiss.livejournal.com]

From the article:

To make things worse, is is harder for a "social supernode" to start using Social Network software in the first place. That's because someone who knows everyone is going to have to take a lot longer to enter all his connections into the software.

Surely that implies that the social software only has a "one way relationship model", as in if A say B is a friend (B 'is friend of' A) that is not registered that A is a friend of B (A 'is friend of' B). Sure, some people say that they are friends with others when they are not but that aside, I think it is feasible to say that for the majority of friendships that friendship is a two-way, mutual relationship.

As such, while a supernode may have a lot of friends, if a large proportion of their friends were already in the software and had listed them as a friend, the 'supernodes' would have less information to add as they would already have a "mutal erlationship" setup.. so less friendships to declare.

Does that make sense, or am I just having a usual Monday morning kinda day? *grin*

[reddragdiva]

As far as I can tell, the supernodes know all these people for a reason, e.g. reading their journals, knowing them as part of the same social group or whatever. The pure social software like Friendster doesn't have an actual reason.

[loosechanj.livejournal.com]

Sometimes I like to go on friendster and people shop for girls who would never even give me the time of day.