Whether you are 17 or 67, Facebook is the standard method to make friends, to keep friends, to spy on friends and to invite friends to events. Facebook creator Mark Zuckerberg championed the cause for Internet authenticity, encouraging users to have single online identities. On the opposite extreme of the argument, 4chan, a collaboration of anonymous users, has churned out both creative Internet trends and headline grabbing pranks. 4chan’s founder Christopher “Moot” Poole believes this anonymity is the key to online authenticity.
Today’s infographic shows these divergent philosophies of Internet culture and, most interestingly, what the average Internet user thinks about the privacy of their information online. What type of user are you? Do you prefer anonymity or transparency?
As a somewhat hesitant social networker, these are issues I have thought a lot about. Even with Facebook’s push toward transparent identities, a user’s real information can be tweaked to a more socially acceptable version of the truth with flattering pictures and a carefully crafted profile page. Facebook culture may never be truly authentic or transparent, but maybe that is just an inherent flaw in the medium. On the flip side, while anonymity allows users to truly express their beliefs and feelings without fear of reprisal, it also removes accountability of words and actions. I doubt there is a hard and fast rule on whether transparency or anonymity online is a better tactic, and it is clear that each has uses for different groups. It is up to us as individual users to make the call. [Via]
Hurricane season isn’t one to be messed with. Just last year my parent’s Houston home had a tree split in half, crash into the roof and half of our house flooded. And while we know the progression from tropical depression to storm to hurricane, there are many facts that were brand new to me due to this infographic.
One thing that I have always found fascinating is the eye of the hurricane. The idea of a calm area amidst a ring of chaos has always had a strange effect on me. And within this eye is a span of 20-40 feet of calm. Definitely where i want to be.
As a rule we always hear “hot air rises,” and that is clearly a fact. The humid, hot air from the ocean rises, circulates, and falles creating a circle of destruction. As a Texan, I will definitely be aware of hurricane season from August-October, as the Pacific Ocean warms up and creates a hot bead of hurricanes. [InfographicWorld]
In recent years we have seen our cellular devices become much more than just phones. Even before the iPhone, our devices were becoming less like phones and more like computers. With the advent of the iPhone we crossed the threshold into a world where we are more concerned with our cell phones than we are with our wallets. If you don’t believe me look it up, people are more likely to leave home without their wallets than they are their phones. I myself am guilty of this, I have turned back for phone, but have managed to get on without a wallet.
Today’s infographic looks at a market that was once dominated by the likes of gameboy and psp. Now with games like angry birds, fruit ninja, stick wars, zombie trailer park (one of my favorites), and others companies like Apple are now in the gaming industry. Cell phones are becoming the all-in-one device allowing us to do anything from taking a picture to looking up a place to eat to using plants to ward off hordes of zombies.
One of the more surprising factoids in today’s infographic is the percentage of female to male gamers. In the mobile gaming market population females account for 53%, a nice shift from the usual video gaming demographic. While I would still choose to play XBOX over playing on my phone, mobile games are certainly getting better, and what’s better than having one device that can do everything? What’s even better is the portability! [via]
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I try to get enough food into my body, not physical objects. Today’s interesting graphic shows the items that have misfortunately been put into the human body. First off, someone ate a razor blade. This is impossible. No one would be alive after eating a razor blade. I don’t care what kind of person you are, it wouldn’t work. This graphic says otherwise, but I don’t believe it.
Now that I have that off my chest I will tell you about my button problem when I was a kid. My problem was that my buttons would pop off my shorts or shirt and I was a dumb kid so I would chew on them. Then I would accidentally swallow the buttons. This happened 4 or 5 times until finally I learned not to chew on my buttons. I never fell ill from eating the buttons, maybe munching on plastic isn’t bad for you?
My buttons cannot even compare to some of the other objects on here: airplanes, safety pins and a bike? Why waste a perfectly good bicycle? That is the dumbest thing in the world. Go give it to someone who could use it to better their lives, don’t eat it! Imagine having lunch one day, you leave the deli to unlock your bike to leave when there is a guy next to it with a screwdriver and a bottle of ketchup halfway through digesting your rear breaks. Ridiculous. [Via]
Google Plus is definitely the hottest new social media tool in my books. My Facebook news feed over the past month has constantly been people either asking for invites or telling people to add them on Google Plus. I couldn’t resist my curiosity and decided to get one, and I must say I love the layout. As I expected, Google kept their design simple and user friendly, although I’m still adjusting to the new features. The Facebook ads are starting to become overwhelming and a bit intrusive, and my Google Plus profile looks much cleaner than my Facebook.
This infographic fleshes out more details of Google Plus that I would not figure out just by going to the website. I must admit it will be difficult to throw away the Facebook format and adopt a totally new style. Give Google Plus a try if you haven’t already, and write some comments on how you feel about it. Also leave comments on something cool you’d like to see an infographic on, and if we can’t find one, maybe we’ll make it! [Via]
