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Hi, I'm Daniela. Welcome to my personal lair on the Internet. This is where I write about storytelling, activism, technology and pop culture. Sometimes I post videos. I update my lair when the mood strikes me. Follow me on Twitter for daily updates (@dcap).

Gen-Twitter Malaise: Salvation through LibraryThing?

I rarely get excited about social networking sites anymore. Call it a hazard of working in the digital realm – overloads the senses with 2.0 detritus and quickly removes the novelty of the ever growing twitteration of my generation. “Always On” holds no real appeal to me anymore. Lately, it all feels like to much of a competition on how “connected” we are.

twitterdude1: I’m at x conference and I know more than you could dream about x product

me: i give a ****

Lately I have been suffering from digital misanthropy and here’s why:The initial attraction to social networking sites, for me, was the ability to meet new friends with similar interests from around the world. Ideally, they might become meatspace friends at some point, or at the very least, share info with me on our shared interests. But after a few years of checking into my livejournal/friendster/myspace/bebo/vox/facebook accounts, I find myself wondering – do I even care about meeting anyone in here? Ever again? Mmm. No. Not really. Not anymore.

With the increasing prevalence of phony profiles used to sell Viagra and Macy’s gift cards, peer profiles created solely for personal marketing/self promotion, I have been finding it difficult lately to both search for or add potential new pals of quality. I mean, what’s the point? Someone’s just going to hack into their account and fill my inbox with spam anyway.

Niche social networking sites – sites that cater to specific interest – like AdultFriendFinder weren’t attractive either. Primarily AFF – in that I don’t want to meet people for sex (for the most part), and that many of the niche sites were like all the others: upload a photo, write a played up bio, and immediately start lying to yourself and everyone.

Until I “stumbled upon” LibraryThing.

Site Description:

LibraryThing is an online service to help people catalog their books easily. You can access your catalog from anywhere—even on your mobile phone. Because everyone catalogs together, LibraryThing also connects people with the same books, comes up with suggestions for what to read next, and so forth.

What? Discovering people through their book collections? Getting the scoop on new books through tags? I actually care? Interesting.

Business 2.0 Magazine recently did a story on LibraryThing.

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