Indirect Manipulation

Originally posted in AniktoBlog on 06/30/09.

Last weekend I had the pleasure of attending Helen Keller Day in Second Life, a 24-hour event sponsored by Virtual Helping Hands. The theme of the presentations and discussion was to raise awareness for Second Life users with disabilities, who continue to utilize virtual environments as a means to engage in communities and outreach.

Keller Johnson Thompson (great-grandniece of Helen Keller) gave the keynote, followed by representatives of Linden Lab and the National Coalition for Disability Rights. Subsequent presentations covered a variety of topics, from digital education to game design.

Possibly the most intriguing development was the world premier of “Max,” a virtual guide dog created specifically for blind or visually impaired SL users. Not unlike other virtual prototypes that use 3D sound spatialization, Max helps users navigate through the world by providing metadata on an avatar’s surroundings:

Max is designed to help the visually impaired navigate Second Life by finding any object (including another avatar) and leading his avatar owner to the object. Max also gives his avatar owner constant feedback (via text and audio) on what is in the immediate area, facilitating not only navigation but also providing a sense of what is in the area that might be of interest.

Interestingly, there is increased discussion of late regarding the implementation of common web accessibility standards to the virtual space. Among the issues being raised are:

• How to provide alternative means of identifying and activating objects
• True speech-to-text capability
• Alternative image and inventory processing
• Primary screen functions that are accessible through redundant key and speech inputs

As we move closer to defining what public accommodation means in these new technological contexts, it will be fascinating to see what comes next.

The Mandelbrotian set is a mathematical concept referring to a grouping of points within a complex plane, which when separated appear as minimized versions of the whole. Nassim Nicholas Taleb mentions Mandelbrot’s theory in his book The Black Swan when discussing the random affinity of nature. Rocks and leaves form the structure of mountains and trees, respectively. Other than scale, the appearance and makeup of a rock is indistinguishable from the qualitative properties of a boulder.

Technology operates in sort of the same way, particularly in the way we connect with one another. In a previous post, I mentioned the decorporeal effect that is achieved when a media object (such as an avatar or a Facebook profile) takes on the characteristics of a person’s identity.

This only happens if digital engagement is achieved with the same level of empathy as one might cultivate through face-to-face or spoken dialog. This requires trust in the digital landscape, the personae who reside within it, and the vehicles by which they interoperate. Often one becomes a subset of the other, thus forming the “social networking” structure we read so much about lately.

As new technologies are introduced, client organizations are increasingly coming to grips with the responsibilities of utilization. Consider how such tools as Twitter have impacted business climates strictly governed by legal and medical regulations. During the opening of this week’s Healthcare Communication & Marketing Association (HCMA) meeting, for example, a number of key thought leaders attempted to define the use of social media within the pharma communication space. Republican Senator Jennifer Beck took on the topic with a comparative case study:

“If our president can make the leap into [social media], we all can,” Beck told the audience. “You should be able to put the right information out there without a million regulations from FDA.”

A day later, what was reported to be the first officially branded tweet in the Pharma space emerged for the insulin product Levemir. Included in the body of the Tweet were the full product brand name and generic equivalent, as was a link to the prescribing information via a truncated URL. A view of the @racewithinsulin profile page reveals that the side effects and fair balance are part of the Twitter wallpaper. Ross Fetterolf, VP Digital Strategy at Ignite Health, called it an “historic day” for the use of social media in this context.

The approach has come under some criticism, however. John Mack reports that the majority of Twitter users don’t use the Web to post or view Tweets, and thus would not be able to see the safety information located in the background of the profile page. Mr. Mack continues his analysis from the point of view of an FDA inspector:

[T]his Tweet does not mention any benefits — it’s essentially what’s called a reminder ad, which is not required to include side effect information because it does not mention any benefits. The FDA does not regulate reminder ads, and it is not likely to cite this Tweet as violative.

However, PhRMA’s DTC Advertising Guiding Principles preclude this kind of ad on TV: “DTC television advertising that identifies a product by name should clearly state the health conditions for which the medicine is approved and the major risks associated with the medicine being advertised.”

Mr. Mack is quick to add that PhRMA has yet to develop guidance or best practice for social media in DTC advertising. Personally, I think it sometimes takes a necessary bold step to stretch the boundaries of what can be done within constraints. And I agree with Mr. Fetterolf’s comment when he says “Pharma is doing its best; baby steps forward shouldn’t be shot down because they might appear awkward.”

Still, Mr. Mack brings up some valid concerns — some technological, some marketing — which I’ll interpret by evaluating the Levemir Tweet as a fractal existing within a larger construct. Consider this a Mandelbrotian approach to understanding social media.

To start with, one must consider the wisdom of placing important safety information in the form of a background image. The image is 1550 pixels high with the bottom of the text content stopping at around 550 pixels. On smaller browser windows, the background image cannot be scrolled along with the list of status Tweets. This results in the lower paragraphs of the fair balance being cut off from the bottom, rendering any text lower than 550 pixels from the top inaccessible if the browser has a lot of chrome.

This tactic would not be extensible to users with visual disabilities, who have trouble viewing pictorial content and often rely on screen-reading software to interpret data on Web pages. For a drug with indications for diabetes (and considering that diabetes is the leading cause of blindness for adults aged 20 to 74 years), this strikes me as a misguidance. If legally-required information is not provided in a textual format, such as ALT text on an image placed within markup, then it is unlikely (if not impossible) to be read.

It is further important to understand that the power of social media is in the act of ensuring ubiquity across as many digital outlets as possible. Twitter’s value should not be interpreted as users viewing or posting to a profile page, but rather in the way the streams intersect with other forms of media. It’s not realistic to expect that a piece of content will always be viewed solely from any single point of context.

All this being said — Novo’s tactic isn’t deserving of vitriolic overreaction. The Levemir Tweet is an attempt to write the rule book before the rules are determined, nothing more or less. It’s one small advancement that constitutes a larger and more complex structure. The impact of social media shouldn’t be measured by the message or intent of a single Tweet. It’s in consumer stewardship, as applied to branded content distribution, where the “fair balance” between potential and risk will be found.

One of the challenges to any new technological solution is convincing oneself (and others) that the proposed innovation will provide a better alternative to what it purports to replace. It needs to be cheaper, faster, more effective, and deliver a substantial return on both engagement and investment.

This came up in discussions around a previous post in this space where I outlined some of the developments in the use of virtual technology in the pharma arena. I had mentioned that Enterprising Social Networking (ESN) platforms were being put to use for both online meetings and live training; this resulted in some very fair questions being raised concerning the usefulness of avatar-led experiences, particularly among users who experience even slight degrees of technophobia.

I can attest that the use of a digital avatar is always the primary point of hesitation among client organizations looking to dip their toes into the virtual waters. I have personally heard many colleagues remark on the “creepy” element of assuming a facsimile persona in digital form. I try to use such Web 2.0 technologies as Facebook and LinkedIn as analogous models; when a user creates a Facebook profile, they are in essence cultivating an identity that is at once representative and interchangeable with the self.

To get to that point, however, a great deal of trust must be invested in both the technology and the social structure that surrounds it. As indicated before, I recognize the strong digital divide that demarcates users and their capacity to appreciate these new forms of utilization. I’d be interested to know whether these segments demonstrate clearly defined trends in age, gender, etc.

I do think that there is great potential in the area of workplace socialization, relationship marketing, and online training. People tend to operate within communities joined by practice; novices become experts through social engagement among their peers, using authentic experience gleaned from newly-learned contexts. When the cognitive process is made more visible, measurable results can be evaluated among common workgroups.

I believe that virtual technology can enhance or (in select cases) even replace training methods that are tightly coupled to brittle, task-based instruction. Learning theorist David Jonassen once wrote about the necessity of evolving computer-based learning from a passive, didactic model to one that is more participatory and collaborative in execution. He also mentions the importance of using digital technologies as “mindtools” rather than “productivity tools,” a constructivist approach to gaining self-initiated knowledge through social interaction:

Socially, we collaborate in determining the meaning of certain perceptions. For example, we socially agree on the meaning of a red traffic light, and society negotiates laws to solidify those interpretations. Social negotiation enables us to construct common interpretations of events and objects. Mindtools are media for collaboratively negotiating meaning … striv(ing) to create environments in which learners actively construct their own knowledge, rather than recapitulating the teacher’s interpretation of the world.

Where I’m ultimately heading with this is a conscious investigation of what people expect from digital gatherings, whether it be an online meeting or a training seminar. Is it enough to rely on such social media tools as blogs and tweets to invest messaging to a larger populace? Or are there more innovative forms of social engagement we can pull from virtual worlds to augment how we work and learn together?

Among my interests are the ways in which emerging technology platforms can be integrated within existing business and educational contexts. This conscious investigation can sometimes reveal patterns of trends and initiatives weaving together.

What I’ve noticed in the past month or so is an increase in the amount of chatter regarding the use of virtual technology within the pharmaceutical and healthcare sectors. Particularly rich is the idea that these developments are beginning to coincide with the rising awareness of social media platforms. With new forms of engagement come questions pertaining to user experience, brand cultivation and return on investment.

One area that seems especially ripe for innovation is the world of corporate training. According to an article this week in the New England Business Bulletin, international businesses are using three-dimensional immersive technology to hold meetings and conduct seminars. There are already examples of IBM, Michelin, Xerox and other companies utilizing Second Life’s capabilities to transmit learning materials via text, voice, document sharing, presentation graphics and video:

“[Virtual technology] is currently being used in corporations for teleconferencing, role playing (mock interviews, practicing management strategies, etc.) and simulation (training workers to use a product or practice tasks that would be too costly or dangerous in the real world) and is being increasingly integrated into the workplace,” said Scott Ahrens, a UMass Dartmouth professor in the College of Visual and Performing Arts.

Despite the steep learning curve of using virtual platforms, companies appear eager to invest. Social networking analyst William F. Zachmann predicts a 26% increase in spend on Enterprising Social Networking (ESN) platforms for 2009. Zachmann indicated that tighter budgets require less expenditure on travel and accommodation, and names ESN as “The single greatest innovation over the next decade” as the technology evolves from two-dimensional textual UI to virtual environments.

The use of virtual technology training has extended into the medical field, where rich simulated environments provide opportunities for learning about hospital procedures and protocol. Obviously not intended to replace hands-on instruction, medical students at Imperial College London are participating in a pilot program for game-based training:

“The aim is to develop a more engaging learning environment, rather than just replicate what you have in real life,” said Maria Toro-Troconis, a senior learning technologist at Imperial College London. “Game-based learning plays a very important role.”

One of the more unsavory aspects of Second Life is its (somewhat deserved) early reputation as a digital singles bar. As pointed out this week by Medical News Today, however, researchers at the University of Toronto and the University Health Network’s Centre for Innovation in Complex Care (CICC) have uncovered many therapeutic and educational benefits of the platform. Among the uses being investigated by the CICC include wellness education, medical training and preceptorships, simulation training, disease surveillance, fundraising and research. An encouraging trend is the emphasis on patient education, with the idea that a better informed patient is more likely to adhere to treatment:

Jennifer Keelan, the Principal Investigator on the project, suggests that a major feature for users is the “relative anonymity where patients can seek out information and share health experiences in a safe environment. There is also a great potential for patients to ‘practice being patients’ by virtually experiencing a mammogram or navigating a hospital’s virtual ward they can gain insight into medical procedures and processes to become more informed.”

Another item of note is the creation of a one-day online summit taking place within Second Life, sponsored by the Nonprofit Commons. Participating organizations include AIDS.gov, the American Cancer Society, Virtual Ability and FasterCures.org. Among the proposed topics include health-related mobile platform initiatives, the needs of people with disabilities, recovery services, nutrition, cancer and AIDS communities.

Coupled with other recent developments within the pharma space, I think we’re seeing an increased awareness among health organizations to build innovation within their respective disciplines. The question doesn’t appear to be about whether there is value to utilizing new forms of engagement. It’s rather how these practices can be best implemented within an existing marketing strategy, and to what metric of success a tactic will be evaluated. The potential is there:

“There is a great opportunity here to understand the design features of social media that make it so appealing and accessible to people,” states Leslie Beard, the designer on the [CICC] team. “Once we understand what pulls people to Web 2.0, we can design and apply more effective communication strategies both within and beyond the Internet.”

Originally posted on AniktoBlog, 05/25/09.

A panel discussion took place this week at the International Communication Association Conference in Chicago on conceptual models of inclusion. Among the topics discussed was the role of identity, disability and gender in virtual environments such as Second Life.

Members of the Georgia Institute of Technology, the Georgia Tech Research Institute and the Temple University College of Science and Technology presented a fascinating study on how groups of people choose to self-identify online. Anikto was honored to play a small part in this research based on ongoing studies of how people with disabilities participate in online communities.

Some key top-level findings from the presentation included the following:

• One stated purpose of the study was to explore how attributes of gender, disability and identity provide an understanding of behavior within the Second Life environment
• Schemas of behavior can be developed cognitively as a child, or they may be learned through social interactions experienced over time
• Virtual worlds provide complex interaction and customization controls, affording a high level of personalization and engagement
• Search groups were classified as those categorically identified with aspects of Sexuality, Gender, Disability, Race/Ethnicity and Aging
• Sexuality-identified groups comprised the highest number of distribution, assuming 51% of the categorical group ratio
• Disability-identified groups represented only 5% of the total amount of filtered criteria, which seems strange given that 20% of gamers self-identify as having some form of a disability
• Whether a person decides to disclose a disability in-world is a highly personal choice, perhaps offering a perspective on the complexities of anonymity within virtual environments

Although these are merely selected highlights, what is particularly intriguing about this research is the dovetailing between gaming technology and characteristics of community. Somewhere there exists a subset investigation to determine how these new forms of engagement could enhance such participatory activities as applying for a job or making friends.

A caution could be made that the reason for the comparatively low number of disability-identified groups is the difference in approach among people with varying disabilities. People who live with autism spectrum disorders and Asperger’s syndrome may tend to be more guarded due to a lack of public understanding; whereas someone demonstrating visual evidence of a disability (such as a wheelchair) may decide that such attributes should be transparently conveyed, both in-world and in real life.

What this means from both a user experience and a technology level remains to be seen. Whatever the conclusions, it is clear that some intriguing questions and dilemmas are forming around this notion of the virtual self and how it corresponds to our interpretation of physical ability. Mark Stephen Meadows touches upon this in his book I, Avatar when he mentions the blurry line between the body born as flesh and its digitally-created facsimile:

The psychology of avatars extends into the real world just as our personalities extend into the virtual. Avatars encourage a fracturing of psyche and personality. Almost like cable cutters, they split us open and strip our different personas into individual threads, so we can splice them with other threads on the other end … Maybe avatars comb out the sometimes tangled parts of our personalities and allow us to view them in the light to asses their health, value, and identities. What fragment of my personality does that best represent? Why did I choose it?

The past several weeks have seen a sharp incline in the amount of discussion and activity surrounding social media within the health sciences vector. Pharma firms are looking to channel messaging to promote both branded and non-branded initiatives, and special interest groups are exploring ways to build community around disease states.

There are two important components to this conversation. One is the process by which published content is filtered through a company’s legal and medical review procedures, which can widely vary in both empathy and the level of restriction. Another is the role that communications agencies play in advising their clients on how to best utilize these new communication vehicles.

This past week, I learned from my friend Craig that GlaxoSmithKline launched a US corporate blog, More Than Medicine. The stated intention is to provide a more open dialogue regarding the US healthcare system and what improvements need to take place. Topics thus far have ranged from sun exposure safety to work-based wellness initiatives.

The first question on my mind was how the internal content approval process worked with such a fluid medium. Interestingly, authors posting to the blog do not provide their last name. This policy has led to some criticism that the company is hiding something, but GSK blogger Michael F thinks otherwise:

Due to legitimate privacy and security concerns, our corporate policies generally recommend limiting the amount of personal information we provide externally. One of us has already been quoted in the press about this blog so we’re certainly not hiding anything; but the larger point is that this blog is not about any of us individually; it is about the company as a whole. Adhering to this policy actually allows us to bring wider perspectives from within the company.

Another area of interest within pharma is the growing role of Facebook. A recent poll conducted by Psychiatric Times indicated that 65% of psychiatrists surveyed answered “no” to the question: “Do you agree that pharmaceutical companies should be allowed to join social networking sites, such as Facebook, to promote their products?” John Mack, however, cautions readers when interpreting this number:

This poll allows respondents a great deal of latitude in interpreting the phrase “promote their products.” Does this mean placing an ad in the right-hand column of targeted Facebook pages just like every other advertiser does? Does it mean Facebook pages devoted to products created by pharma marketers? Or does it mean pharma marketers posing as patients and posting comments praising products? I would say “No” to the latter, and say “Yes” to the first two. But I didn’t have that option.

I think what we’re seeing here is a shift in understanding how information is delivered and interpreted. David Weinberger, the author of Everything Is Miscellaneous, describes the “conundrum of control” relinquished by information authorities who are still adjusting to new means of distribution. Beliefs and opinions are no longer formed solely by filtering knowledge through an authoritative expert; rather, knowledge is gleaned by scanning random snippets of text from multiple sources.

I’m not entirely certain as yet what this means for healthcare marketing. The optimist in me believes that an opportunity exists to engage consumers and professionals in open dialogue, with the intention that a more informed user base will help patients and caregivers make more confident choices in managing their wellness.

Three items of note arrived in the RSS feeds this week, all of which have dovetailed into something resembling a common track of thought within my feeble brain.

The first is an initiative launched by Johnson & Johnson’s McNeil Pediatrics, an unbranded Facebook page targeting adults with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Although the J&J drug Concerta is now indicated for patients age 6 to 65, there is no mention of the brand on ADHDAllies. The site instead provides an online place for people with ADHD to find community and support, and its execution cleverly sidesteps some of the legal/medical restrictions that usually impact social media endeavors:

Individuals joining the community page, dubbed “fans” by Facebook, have the option of commenting on the page’s “ADHD Allies Perspective” comment wall. Users wishing to comment are provided with a topic – this month’s topic invites adults with ADHD to share how they felt when first diagnosed with the disorder – with comments subject to “pre-moderation.”

McNeil will not post comments “about any specific products or treatments, whether they are sold by McNeil Pediatrics, affiliated companies, or competitors.” Users are also prompted to accept McNeil’s terms of use prior to posting.

Also from the medical marketing front, we have WebMD about to launch a free mobile drug reference database and drug interaction checker for the iPhone. A spokesperson from WebMD contends that the company is currently focusing on how mobile networks can build communities within a targeted userbase. Also of note is the inclusion of CME activities and accreditation, which suggests that the CME market may be evolving rather than dying.

Finally, discussion around the role of Second Life as a form of social media appears to be heating up (again). A recent blog post by Aliza Sherman lists a number of key features of SL (applicable to virtual worlds in general) that share attributes with Web 2.0 marketing: a deeply loyal community, a sense of belonging to a social order, the ability to conduct SL and real life events in parallel (not unlike a Tweetup), and a rich communication stream.

Despite the downsides, many marketers are making a mistake by not at least experimenting with Second Life … In the same way that it is shortsighted not to at least try Twitter in order to understand this “newfangled” communications tool that has influenced new styles of communications, it is shortsighted not to get an avatar, download the Second Life software, and explore.

These three articles, each covering a different technological stream, indicate to me a potential sea change in the way organizations communicate with their respective audiences. Facebook is becoming increasingly professional, expediting its transition from a friendship vehicle to one where business and altruistic interests converge. Audiences are increasingly in flux and require that information be provided in a format that can be adapted to a particular point of distribution. And the aspect of community that permeates all marketing efforts can transcend from real life to the virtual space.

With Twitter becoming all the rage and corporate personae operating as a profiling device, it will be further interesting to witness how technological developments continue to push the ways we communicate with companies (as well as each other).

There’s an article in this month’s ACM Communications that investigates the trend of computational advertising. This is a fancy term used to describe the algorithms that determine how online messaging is targeted.

Placing an online ad isn’t merely a science of matching keywords. The example cited in the article is that of a Chevy SUV ad that may appear alongside an MSN automobile news feature. If the piece is about an accident that was caused by a flaw in engineering, then it obviously doesn’t add value for the advertiser to be associated with such a tragic occurrence. These mishaps are not only embarrassing but also very expensive.

The idea behind computational advertising is to avoid these types of errors by ensuring that ads are placed in front of users within an appropriate context. Algorithms are developed to replicate and predict how a user might respond, if they had the time to contemplate the full breadth of content displayed in a Web page. The ultimate goal is a sort of accelerated customization, where messaging can be targeted to a specified context not previously attainable:

Before the advent of computational advertising, ad engines could make mistakes more simple-minded than the Chevy SUV scenario. Suppose, for example, a news page contains the word “flowers.” If the article isn’t about flowers but instead revisits the Rolling Stones’ underrated 1967 record Flowers, the reader is unlikely to want ads from florists. The old method of analyzing co-occurring words and phrases doesn’t help much, and neither does frequency.

The methods behind the science involve such tactics as semantic phrase categorization, which works symbiotically with keyword recognition to provide more granularity to search terms. There are ways to measure the exogenous effect that news events may have on a user’s search behavior; for example, an arriving hurricane may cause people to make a trip to Home Depot. Algorithms are increasingly being worked into media buys to provide greater ROI per metric. There are even classification methods that can prevent mismatches on a sub-node level, thus preventing a marketing disaster like the Chevy example cited above.

What’s interesting to me is the growing sophistication among marketers, many of whom now have an expectation that their intended search criteria will be properly disambiguated. It is no longer enough to just place an ad on a page where a product might be mentioned; online advertising has reach a point to where the intention of the user must be considered. Two years ago I wouldn’t have considered advertising a vehicle for user-centered design, but better taxonomic methods have proved these assumptions to be premature.

I should just start every blog post with the same sentence, thus saving myself the effort of typing it every time: “I’ve been really busy lately with work and travel, hence the lack of posts.” As a result, there are a number of technological developments that I’ve neglected to address in this space:

Braille Touchscreens

Finnish scientists have devised a way to bring haptic touchscreen technology to users with impaired vision. Using something called a piezoelectric transducer (I have no idea what that is either), the raised dots common to Braille can be replicated by forcing the screen to vibrate. The “reading finger” touches the screen, its position is logged, and then a sort of Morse code pinpoint is activated. Tests have been conducted at the University of Tempere with single characters; the next step is to represent words and phrases.

Mobile Immersive Experiences

This summer will see the launch of TEVA, a digital platform being dubbed a “mobile immersive experience” that will redefine the future of entertainment. Through a partnership with NBC creator and executive producer Tim Kring, Nokia is set to launch a hybrid of user-generated content and Alternate Reality Gaming (ARG) in their Ovi store this summer. Sarah Perez of ReadWriteWeb explains it pretty well:

(T)he idea of an ARG isn’t an entirely new one, but using the mobile platform to play the game is. Having said that, TEVA isn’t just a traditional ARG moved to the mobile platform - it only involves some elements of that type of story-telling mechanism. Another piece to this mobile experience is user-generation content. This is a new twist. In the past, ARG players would just interact with the story line - now they’re going to help create it. And yet another aspect to this mobile experience will be local. Gameplay takes place in your city - not just in an application or just on the web. How exactly this happens, we don’t know, but TEVA will use GPS and other location-based services in some way.

Beyond the Browser

I’ve been thinking for a while that digital environments will increasingly become less about the browser and more about ubiquitous computing. Meaning that the browser and the OS will at some point harmonize, the OS will bind to a device, the device will become integrated with our life experience, and our life experience will endorse the interoperability of these digital/analog streams.

What this means is that we may see the browser being used in more non-Web contexts, such as the Opera In-Dash Computer User Guide being reported yesterday:

The Opera Internet browser provided with your FWS system provides a superb platform for accessing and viewing websites. Opera works much like the Internet browser on your desktop computer, but it provides improved compatibility in a mobile setting like Ford Work Solutions.

These three items bring to mind the ideas of Nicholas Negroponte, whom I quote all the time and who wrote this over a decade ago: “The access, the mobility, and the ability to effect change are what will make the future so different from the present.” I’m firmly in belief that the Web will become less of a destination and more of a vehicle — one that serves as both a distribution point and a contextual container for ideas that reside continuously in flux.

According to a Nielsen poll represented in today’s NY Times, people aged 25-35 spend the most time on Facebook in January — up to 3.5 hours a day. That’s a lot of omphaloskepsis and reminiscence to pack into a session. By comparison, people aged 12-18 years of age spend a little over two hours.

What this tells me is that, despite its reputation as a mainstay for a generation of digital natives, Facebook offers the most value to people trying to reconnect to their past. Which is fine, provided someone is inclined to allow such deep personal mining. More than this, according to Peggy Orenstein, is that we’ve also redefined the way people grow into adulthood.

Orenstein writes about the phases of maturity — how it is necessary, at various critical points in one’s life, to shed a former self as a means to reinvent an identity. This can happen when someone enters college, gets their first job, moves to a different city or gets divorced. New phases of life allow for a certain degree of swagger; no one remembers that bad haircut or embarrassing incident.

It becomes tricky, though, when someone you haven’t spoken to in 15 years decides to tag you in a photo. Orenstein writes about one student who researched the way college students use Facebook for The Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, who admitted that she felt uncomfortable knowing the intimate details of Facebook “friends” she hadn’t contacted in years.

There may be comfort, however, for folks who want to preserve a form of their prior existence. Orenstein feels that this may recall a more traditional way of keeping bonds alive:

It could be that my generation was the anomalous one, that Facebook marks a return to the time when people remained embedded in their communities for life, with connections that ran deep, peers who reined them in if they strayed too far from the norm, parents who expected them to live at home until marriage (adult children are already reclaiming their childhood rooms in droves).

As more people participate with Facebook (even my mom is inquiring), I think that we’ll hit a tipping point very soon. Web 2.0 will eventually give way to something we’ll call Web 3.0, and it will provide a greater context of information and intrigue beyond our current understanding. At the same time, I get the sense that the next generation of users will demand something more from their social networks: the right to be left alone.