Inhabited Chair: The Social Phenomenon of “25 Random Things”
My name is Zachary Wolfson, I’m a student at Northeastern doing my internship at Shoebuy.com. I will be writing weekly blog entries, which I modeled after “Monday Morning Quarterback” by Peter King who is a great sports writer and always gives some love to my Philadelphia Eagles. Every week, there will be a main story where I discuss something that is happening in the world at that time, my shoe thoughts of the week, where I share my thoughts on a couple of styles and my non-shoe thoughts of the week where I just share random thoughts for your enjoyment.
If you have a Facebook account and haven’t been living under a rock for the past two weeks, then you or someone you know has shared “25 Random Things” with the world. For those of you who don’t know about it, “25 Random Things” is the most popular chain letter on Facebook. When somebody writes 25 random things about themselves they tag 25 people (tagging someone in a note on Facebook notifies the tagged person that the note has been written). These 25 people are then expected to write their own notes about themselves and tag 25 more people. It’s pretty much your garden variety chain letter, except for two things: It’s on Facebook (I know there have been chain letters on Facebook in the past, but never on this scale), and people spread it voluntarily (there are no threats if you don’t forward it). This past week set records on Facebook for number of notes written (The New York Times), which puts the phenomenon in the millions for how many people it has reached. Although by themselves, the numbers are impressive, I would like to focus on the voluntary nature of this particular chain letter.
Today, people feel more comfortable sharing their thoughts with complete strangers. As a blogger I can see why, it can be quite cathartic. The way this exploded, I feel like people were just waiting for an excuse to share a bit of themselves with the world. Of course there’s more at play here than just a pent-up need to share. Although there is no direct threat, there is a lot of indirect peer pressure and band wagon jumping. Everybody’s Facebook homepage contains a daily feed of what their friends are up to and last week a good portion of the news about my friends had something to do with “25 Random Things.” This creates the feeling that everyone else is doing it and who among us wants to be left behind? Sure, I chose not to take part in it, but that’s because my distrust of people outweighs my need to fit in. For most people however, especially teenagers, the need to fit in can override almost everything else and the transparency of Facebook has only exaggerated that. This is not necessarily good or bad, but it is interesting. I admit that when I first saw a “25 Random Things” note I thought it was stupid, but now that I have seen it so often I briefly considered writing my own note. People can have tremendous influence over their peers, so please don’t abuse it.
Shoe Thoughts of the Week:
Since my main story this week focuses on a trend I am going to honor another one that was well before my time. I am going to highlight platform shoes.
The Jessica Simpson Gusla puts a modern twist on the old fad. This attention grabbing shoe is perfect for formal occasions when you want to stand out.
The Nomad Ice platform sandals are sure to give you a boost, both in height and in fashion. With a rhinestone adorned upper you can look glamorous, pool-side.
These shoes will have you reminiscing about those old days. After you put these on, you’ll want to break out those disco records and boogie.
Non-Shoe Thoughts of Week:
- LOST Thoughts:
- This week’s episode seemed like it was little more than a teaser for next week’s episode.
- As with all of LOST’s main characters, there’s far more to Daniel Faraday than we first suspected. Not only is he Eloise Hawking’s son, but we now know that he told a younger Charlotte to stay away from the island. Also he looks as though he has not aged since the flashback with him in the Orchid. It is unlikely that he is a native of the island like Richard because he stays put during the flashes while Richard does not. Having said that, Daniel has not gotten nose bleeds like Sawyer and Juliet despite being on the island before either of them, especially Sawyer.
- Ben was clearly surprised to see Desmond when he went to go visit Eloise, Desmond breaks all the rules.
- In a not-so-subtle religious allegory, John Locke speaks to a father, Christian Sheppard, then decides he must sacrifice himself to make up for the wrong others have done (leave the island).
- It looks like we get an explanation of how to find the island next week. I can’t wait.
- The Office Thoughts
- I told you that the detour wouldn’t end up well.
- Angela Martin is messed up, liking your cats? Come on.
- The cold-open was a recap of part 1 so that ends the streak of good ones at 2.
- I watch 30 Rock occasionally and this week had one of the funniest lines ever. It was a blind girl accepting a date from Kenneth because her instincts told her it was right. “My instincts have never lead me astray before, except for looking at the solar eclipse.” I almost died laughing.
Thanks for reading, I always enjoy hearing from my readers so leave lots of comments on anything I’ve said. Please subscribe to the Shoebuyblog.com RSS feed and tell all your friends.
February 24th, 2009 at 10:02 pm
I thought the line from 30 Rock cited above was one of the best lines ever. good catch. If you can’t trust your instincts, what can you trust?
Dave