The Internet for Monkeys: why Social Networking Works
fred@emu.edu.com
fred+smith@emu.edu
fred@emu..edu
Which one likely contains a mistake?
Odds are, if you're a programmer, or you've been on the internet for a decent period of time, you have some ability to parse and analyze email-address-like strings. You understand the first part is a user, like a unix shell account name. You understand the @ divides the user from the domain. The domain itself you know contains a variety of hierarchical fields separated by dots, and you know about things like country codes.
This is what email addresses look like to normal people:
234#%##%@#%#oooO.234
OO(#NN#}}{##>>)
##$@#Q$L()))N#@@@
Now, which one of those is well-formed? Which two are equivalent and are likely delivered to the same address?
Instead, you go to your Monkey-Compatible Communications Portal. You click on the face of the person you want to tell. You type. It gets sent.
Social Networking Software is anchored by it's ability to put a human face on communication.
Who's working on a face-based email client?
There are other implications. The "monkeysphere" of 150 people who's lives we can keep track of roughly corresponds to the typical "friends" list. You think about somebody you want to contact who isn't on your list, then you think about who they know that you know, and you "pass through" that person, clicking on the mutual friend to get to the person you want to talk to.
It's pretty simple, really. It's about humanizing communication.