A Life in Tweets

I get these obsessions. Have I ever mentioned that before? Anyway, something catches my interest and I then focus upon it intensely, until I become an expert. Or lose interest. These obsessions can last for months, years, decades even. Or just a few days. I had one of the latter type over the weekend, (two, actually, if you include Sunday's Mantan Moreland marathon). To cut to the chase, on Friday, whilst searching for material for the next Sleazecast, I stumbled across someone else's podcast, with a similar name. Being an obsessive git, within minutes I'd located the podcaster's homepage and had listened to several of his programmes. The most striking thing about them was their level of professionalism in terms of production values and editing. Plus, the guy doing them has a terrific 'radio' voice, far better than mine. Indeed, some of the later ones sounded like very slick local radio broadcasts - he has that kind of voice. That said, the problem with them was, to be frank, a lack of any really substantive content. Clearly, he had the means to produce a podcast, but having made the decision to start recording them, realised he didn't have a clue what they should be about. Consequently, they consist of bits of trivia involving his friends, sandwiched between well produced idents and links. This lack of focus had obviously become a problem as, since he started the podcasts in 2005, their frequency had declined, with the last being dated last Summer. Or so I assumed.

But obviously, with my determination to become an instant 'expert' on these podcasts, I couldn't leave it there. Reading the site and listening to the podcasts wasn't enough. I had to know more - about their creator, the context in which they were produced and exactly why they had become less frequent. Which is where social networking comes into its own - from the website I was able to read his Twitter feed and Facebook pages, both of which revealed a wealth of information. First off, it confirmed the guy was still alive. However, his Twitter feed revealed that he's spent several weeks in hospital before Christmas as a result of a prolapsed disc. Following surgery, he was now recuperating at home in Berkshire, where he'd recently moved. Which explained the lack of recent podcasting activity. Older Tweets indicated that, for the past couple of years, he'd been going abroad for work quite frequently, possibly explaining the declining frequency of his podcasts. Looking at some of the other Twitter accounts he linked to allowed me to find out that he worked for an educational charity with various projects in the developing world - hence the overseas trips. I also found that he ran his own business on the side, producing corporate podcasts for clients - which explained the level of professionalism displayed by his podcasts. By the end of the weekend I knew which football team he supported, the town he'd been born in, his birthday and the names and professions of several of his friends. At which point, I lost interest.

Now, whilst I know that this looks like borderline stalking on my part, the real point I'm trying to make is how much information about themselves people put on line, and just how easy it is to access it. Bear in mind also, that most of the personal information I gleaned came from Twitter - the social networking tool that asks for the least personal information from its users. Yet they still give out these details willingly! Personally, I've never understood this urge to 'share' your entire life with complete strangers via social networking sites. For one thing, most lives are incredibly dull and of no possible interest to me. For another, it's potentially dangerous. Trust me, being anti social has its advantages! The fact is that I do 'share' stuff, in the sense that I publish my creative activities here and on The Sleaze. Frankly, that's more than enough. You people don't need to know my personal details, or what I had for lunch. Which is why I'm bloody useless when it comes to social networking _ I just don't see the point.