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How Many Friends Can You Manage?

UPDATE 1: Similar article regarding Dunbar's Number.

11/13/2009

British anthropologist Robin Dunbar suggests that the number of people with whom one can maintain stable social relationships is roughly one hundred fifty people. A stable social relationship is defined as one where an individual knows who each person is and how each person relates to every other person.

This got me thinking: With the rise of social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace, how does Dunbar's number apply to network-based social "communities"?

I have about three hundred "friends" on Facebook and roughly five hundred followers on Twitter.

Because I approve my Facebook friends, I have a working knowledge of who they are and some knowledge of how they link to my other friends.

My Twitter community is a completely different story. Other than a one hundred forty character biographic description, I know next to nothing about my Twitter followers.

Is the way we create relationships changing as a result of network-based social communities? Do we have too many "friends"? Can we effectively engage them all?

"People" by Lola Grace

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Untitled 20091008

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To-do List

In my post last Friday I wrote about the "Forgetful Mind." To combat the forgetful mind -- or as I rationalize it: I'm older, have more responsibility, which means more things to remember, and I can't remember them all... -- I make "to-do" lists.

I have a running to-do list of things, both personal and professional, I want to get done, and that list just keep growing. There's no way I could remember all the things I am trying to get accomplished without my to-do list.

Even without the forgetful mind I've always made to-do lists. At least I've made them since I have had to manage things to get done - probably starting in high school.

My to-do list process has evolved over time, but there is one constant: I have to have them typed/written on paper. I have tried to manage them electronically - and I do store them electronically - but, for execution, I need a piece of paper.

If I remember correctly, the human mind can remember about seven things at any given point - that's why a phone number has seven numbers. My current to-do list has thirty-nine items. Obviously, I'm not going to remember all thirty-nine items, and recall them when I need them most.

A simple to-do list system helps keep me on track.

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Lollipops

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UPDATE: What Gordon Gekko Can Teach Us About Smartphones

UPDATE: "Morgan Stanley: Mobile Internet Market Will Be Twice The Size of Desktop Internet" and With a New Phone, Google May Challenge Apple"

I found these articles interesting because they speak to my "If your are not connected, you are not connected" philosophy. The Morgan Stanley study is pretty definitive about the projected growth of the smartphone. Google's recent overtures into building a smartphone, as opposed to just supplying the Android operating system for them, is telling of how important they think the future smartphone market will be. It's coming folks... Eventually, being constantly connected to a network is going to be the the rule, and not the exception.

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June 2009

TECHNOLOGY: "Smartphone Rises from Gadget to Necessity," by Steve Lohr, New York Times, 10 June 2009.

For a growing swath of the population, the social expectation is that one is nearly always connected and reachable almost instantly via e-mail. The smartphone, analysts say, is the instrument of that connectedness — and thus worth the cost, both as a communications tool and as a status symbol.

If someone would have asked me two years ago if I would spend my money to buy a smartphone, I would have told them they were crazy. I've been issued Blackberrys for work, and that is how I got my first "taste" of, what I refer to as, my "mobile brain." However, I wasn't ready to spend my hard-earned money on a personal smartphone. Then I began commuting to work in DC on the train/metro and AT&T offered me a Blackberry for thirty dollars -- it's been all down hill since then.

I used the Blackberry for about seven months and then traded up to an iPhone. I couldn't survive without it now. My personal and professional lives depend on having constant access to the network.

Some may scoff at this notion, but before you pass judgment ask yourself: Could you survive without your cell phone? I would venture that many would say yes they could, but if you dig deep and really think about how much you rely on your cell phone, I think you would have to admit that it would be difficult.

It's the same way with a smartphone, which is essentially a cell phone on steroids. The main difference between a regular cell phone and a smartphone is the smartphone's data plan, which provides access to the internet.

Now, let me cut to what I really want to talk about, which is the nature of the world some live in now, and most soon will live in in the future. The days of constant connectivity are coming, and it's going to be very difficult to avoid it. Sure, you can go Ted Kazinsky and check out of society -- please don't send letter bombs to people -- but few are disciplined enough to pull this off.

For the rest of us, we're going to be expected to be connected ALL the time. Just look at the rise of social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter. We are living in the age of the constant stream of information -- real time information. I've said it before, knowledge is power; those that have the knowledge, have the power and the advantage. Being constantly plugged into the network is the means for obtaining the knowledge. Smartphones are becoming the delivery mechanism for maintaining the constant stream of information.

Gordon Gekko, Michael Douglas's character in the movie Wall Street said it best. In a discussion with Bud Fox, Charlie Sheen's character, Gekko said, "The most valuable commodity I know of is information. Wouldn't you agree?" Gekko proceeds to tell Fox that if he wants to be a player he needs to start getting information. He finishes the discussion by telling Fox, "If you are not inside, you are outside."

My point here is that it's important to feed your brain, and more and more this is happening through smartphone-like devices. To paraphrase Gordon Gekko: If you are not connected, you are not connected.

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Life as Business

Do you run your life like a business? That's a weird question, huh? What I mean is: do you handle your finances, your time, your resources, your "people" (spouse and children) like you would if you were running a business?

I know this sounds cold, and maybe it is. But, if you consider the things that make a business successful - accurate finances, customer service, quality work/products - aren't these the same things that could make your life successful?

Pay your bills on time and live within your means. Take care of your spouse and kids to the best of your ability. And strive to be the best spouse and parent you can possibly be - make yourself better every day.

When you look at it this way, doesn't make sense to run your life similar to running a business?

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"Possessions are a way of turning money into problems." - Brian Eno

Yet another quality quote from Bono's 14 November New York Times column. In our "if some is good, more is better" society, Eno's quote succinctly summarizes the overall problem.

It's difficult to get out of the spending cycle. We've created a society where our way of life - our economy - depends on Americans spending and accumulating.

We buy stuff to replace perfectly good stuff, only to throw perfectly good stuff away (which causes environmental problems), and buy more stuff. And that stuff is bought on credit, which many Americans can't afford to pay off. It's a vicious cycle.

It's hard to break the cycle because we all want. We want the best stuff for ourselves and the best stuff for our kids.

Maybe if we wanted a little less and appreciated a little more, life would be easier.

How much stuff do you need? Does that stuff really make you happy? Is that stuff really what is important?

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What Really Matters

What do you see in the picture? Maybe a whale, truck, cream cheese tub, and a travel bottle of shampoo?

To a four year old these items are fifteen minutes of pure bathtub enjoyment.

I watched my daughter so completely focused on these objects in the bathtub that she was oblivious to the fact that she was almost hypothermic because the water temperature was dropping. Oh, and by the way, that cream cheese tub is not a cream cheese tub, it's a boat.

It's the holiday season, and watching my daughter derive so much pleasure out of those four simple toys helped set the tone for me for the rest of the season.

It's not about "Black Friday" and waiting in line for hours outside Best Buy to save $50 on a television.

It's about the simple pleasures in life. It's about watching your daughter completely enthralled with a whale, truck, cream cheese tub (boat), and a travel bottle of shampoo.

These are the things that make her and me happy. These are the things that really matter.

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Shiny With Bright Flashing Lights

I spent some time in a New Haven, CT BW3's recently and made an interesting observation. It's not an earth shattering observation because I think we are all aware of it. It was just one of those "aha" moments when something becomes perfectly clear.

It was your typical BW3's: football on TV (I was watching my Michigan State Spartans implode against Penn State) and good wings.

But, this BW3's had another element: It had a gaming area with several large, shiny games with bright flashing lights.

My aha moment of clarity was this: If you put a large, shiny game with bright flashing lights in a bar, grown men will waste their hard-earned cash to play the game -- even if they have no earthly clue how to play it or hope to win at it.

Now mind you, this BW3's was near the campus of Yale, and it was the Saturday of the Harvard vs Yale football game, so there was (or should have been) a lot of brain power in the bar. Brain power that should have known better than to waste money on large, shiny games with bright flashing lights.

But, the allure of these games was too much for the male patrons. They had to test their "skills" against games (a large punching bag game and, what looked like, a large "poor man's" version of Tetris, to name a couple) that were probably unwinable.

To make matters worse, the punching bag game promised a free sixteen ounce beer to the person who broke the high score.

What does it all mean? I think it means that men are gullible, but I'm happy to say that I resisted the temptation to plug my cash into one of the large, shiny games with bright flashing lights. A moral victory?

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Appearance Is Everything

"Always be more than you appear and never appear to be more than you are."

The above quote came from a 14 November column written by Bono for the New York Times. According to Bono, the quote was something German Chancellor Angela Merkel (she attributed it to her father) said during a conversation she was having with Bono and Bob Geldof.

I'm not sure if it's an original quote by Merkel's father, but it said volumes to me. Below are a few things that came to mind immediately when I read the quote.

Always be more than you appear...
- Don't believe your press clippings or your evaluations.
- Constantly strive to be better every day -- never be satisfied.
- If something is worth doing, it's worth doing well.
- Work as hard as you can always.

...never appear to be more than you are.
- A little humility goes a long way.
- Let your actions speak for you.

If more people prescribed to Merkel's fathers' school of thought the world would be a much better place.

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