Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Diaspora, a KickStarter Darling

For over a year now I have been bemoaning Facebook's assault on its users' privacy, and thankfully, the din is growing. But from the beginning of Facebook trampling on its users, I've wondered if someone was going to come quickly with their offering of a site that has many of the advantages of Facebook without the tricks. Aah! that may soon be upon us! Yep, you may still be able to easily share with your friends and family without having to hide from the continual stripping Facebook gives you.

The lovely site KickStarter has been helping to promote the innovative among us who don't make the circuit with VC guys. It's a sort of collective angel investor in cyber world to which you have to be invited, and recently they invited a group launching what hopefully will be a comfortable alternative to Facebook. Oh, you're done with that? Think again. Social media, and especially sites such as Facebook, are eclipsing the phone and the post office, so I'm not so sure it's that easy to give up. There was a time when I thought I could walk away from Facebook. But my angst about it bordering on downright hatred during the last year has not been enough to make me leave it. The richness and ease of staying in touch with family is hard to give it up. But now there may be a better way.

Diaspora is a project being launched by four students at NYU. It's a sort of twist on the Cloud. I'm not quite sure how it works yet, but my curiosity is killing me. Need to go read on it some more, but in the meantime, I'll let the young men tackling this idea speak for themselves:



Thoughts about the video:

It might be a little scary to think of having your own "node," but maybe it's time you got in the 21st century and learned how to control your cyber information, or someone else will control it. Frankly, this idea will probably be old hat in a few years, so why not get on board now? If you're interested in being part of the test program for Disapora, you can get on their mailing list, and they may send you an invite. Invites start today.