Social Networks - not everyone is a fan

I think John Dvorak is on to something here:

Why Social Networks Stink - Columns by PC Magazine:
"There's something annoying about the emergence of the now-ubiquitous social network. My displeasure reached a peak over the weekend when I was recording an edition of the Twit podcast in which Robert Scoble was ranking on the new Amazon e-book reader, the Kindle. His main complaint was that the product did not incorporate any social-networking structure. This was the last straw for me.

I mean, exactly how plugged into the community do you actually have to be nowadays to be okay with yourself?

Scoble's displeasure was somewhat understandable once he explained his idea. He meant that if one of his friends also had a Kindle, it would be cool to find out what books they had loaded on the thing and what they were currently reading. Personally, I'm thinking that this is yet another invasion of privacy."

"... What has been overlooked in the entire social-networking scheme is that at its core, it's not social networking but marketing. In fact, the entire MySpace scene is devoted mostly to selling music and keeping people up-to-date with their fav indie band. Sometimes events, such as a rave or a house party, can be announced on MySpace, although the real winner is still the indie band."

I'm not sure everyone would agree about these MySpace conclusions, but I'm certain most people who peruse one of these sites has wondered about the honesty of what they were reading. People are either marketing themselves or their products on these sites - they should be taken with a grain of salt, and not every new product is required to include a social-networking component.

BTW - The Kindle looks like a very good e-book reader, perhaps worth the price increase over the Sony. My concern is whether I really want another expensive device that can easily be lost, stolen, broken, or drowned.

The electronics will eventually be small enough to place inside a wristwatch - at that point, perhaps the electronic paper could be unrolled from a scroll the size of a pen, or perhaps replaced with a projection screen, possibly built into a pair of glasses.