There’s a classic moment in Seinfeld when two spheres of George Kostanza’s world that he was wanting to keep separate intersected. “It’s worlds colliding, Jerry!” Something to be avoided at all costs.
It’s natural for us to have such partitions. Our identities are different when we are dealing with our parents, our close friends, our colleagues, our students. It’s natural and there’s nothing wrong with it. We need to be able to tell fart jokes to your old high school buddy one moment, be silly with our children the next, then act professional at a meeting with senior management.
This is precisely the protocol that Facebook violates, by having all “friends” be on the same plane, be they friends, parents, work colleagues or nieces.
On the one hand this is a good thing. It makes us all chillax a bit about the various pretensions we uphold in the spheres of our life.
On the other hand, it’s a bad thing. because despite the Facebook culture, most of us do still have that need to keep our worlds from colliding. The stories of people who inadvertently made fools of themselves at work for what they did over the weekend are legend. And sometimes, you want to share something silly with one group, that your parents, or your kids, or your employer just should not see. Without control over who gets to see information you post, prudent people must keep their edgy side under wraps. Controversial topics that might offend people whom you don’t want to hurt must go unspoken.
So here is the design to steal for Facebook: allow us to define spheres of friends and place each friend in one more more sphere. When we post something, give us the option of limiting who gets to see it: everybody, or just certain spheres.
This same facility could be used for special interest sub-groups among your friends. You could have a sphere for your college classmates, your high school classmates, your club, and so on, and post statuses or pictures that only they would see.
Allowing spheres would open up all kinds of new usage patterns and prevent users from having to water down the information they broadcast. Go to it, Facebook!
You’ve hit the nail on the head!! This is an absolute necessity, and if facebook doesn’t jump on it, either myspace or some new tool will. Because I’m already so well entrenched in facebook I hope they’ll be the ones to do it first and do it well.