Antisocial Social-Networking

Monday through Friday, I get a daily newsletter in email form entitled Shelf Awareness. While I believe the audience for the newsletter is the book publishing/selling industry, I use it mainly for the information it provides concerning which authors are on which TV shows. Then when a patron calls about a book they saw on the Today Show, I have some idea of what they are referring to and can help them. Sometimes I also find write-ups about books I would like to read. I usually just skim over the content. Sometimes I delete the email without even reading it. On Monday, October 1, they had an entry regarding Goodreads which caught my eye. I had never heard of Goodreads so I stopped and read:

In a piece in the Stranger, Elliott Bay Book Company's Paul Constant calls Goodreads "Facebook for Book Nerds" and "the most Antisocial Social-Networking Site on the Internet."

"I first noticed www.goodreads.com four months ago when a coworker at my bookstore sent me an invitation," Constant wrote. "The website tore through the Seattle bookselling community like an STD. Soon, every bookseller under 40 was a member. 'Will you be my Goodreads friend?' we'd whisper to each other among the stacks. It was like MySpace, only better--it was all about books."

While chronicling the fast rise and more recent leveling off of local interest in Goodreads, Constant also asked an intriguing question: "Does anyone over the age of 16 even have a favorite book? Claiming a favorite is only indicative of the fact that you haven't read enough: Out of the thousands of books that I've read, with the enormous palette of ideas and emotions they've represented, how could I choose only, say, five? Why not ask for a favorite orgasm, or laugh, or grain of sand?"
I looked at Goodreads and it reminds me a lot of LibraryThing. You enter in the books you own and/or read and put in a review of them. You can contact and communicate with other people who have similar appetites. My problem with both is that I do not want to take the time to enter what I am reading and what books I own. I read fast. Updating would be a burdensome chore rather than an enjoyed activity.

I now realize I do not recreationally use the Internet for friends and conversation. This is what separates me from many other users. Because I do not desire to socially network, it is hard for me to understand the benefits of using the associated online tools with regards to work. While I do enjoy reading classmates’ blogs, I do not take pleasure in writing mine because it is a task rather than a desired activity. It is far easier for me to get up in front of class and talk for two minutes than write three hundred plus words (479 words and counting) in a blog every week. This is how I view technology this week.