Thing 15 -- Digg

I totally Digg it! What a cool idea! I had a blast browsing through the various articles, reading comments, and finding out what seems to be "hot" in the news right now. The idea of the community dictating what stories it deems newsworthy makes a lot of sense. How many times have we watched the news and thought, "Do they really need to spend this much time and energy on a story like this?" Well with Digg, the community decides what is important, so the junk may fall to the wayside. I also like the idea of "self-policing." If something is inappropriate or not considered worthy of attention, it can be buried. That helps maintain higher standards of quality for the stories being posted. I may have to frequent this site to get my news in a more filtered manner.

I honestly don't know if I'll join this network--thanks to the 23 Things, I've joined way more social networks than I ever anticipated. I can only handle so much virtual socializing. I need to focus on the actual people in front of me, too, you know. This is one concern that I have with social networking in general. Are people spending more time in the virtual social world than with the people in close proximity? It irks me to no end to see young people texting when there are other people sitting with them at the same table. Don't the people in your presence deserve your attention more than someone on the other end of a cell phone (or social networking site)? I guess I'm just getting old, but I think some cell phone etiquette or "textiquette" is in order.

Wow...that was an aside I wasn't expecting. I just don't want to become one of those people that is so absorbed with social networking and technological hype that I begin to neglect the important things and people in my life. I've seen it happen too many times. As much as I love technology and the fact that social networking has brought me back into contact with so many people I've lost touch with, I can't lose touch with the reality of the present.