First of all, is it me or are domain names getting weirder and weirder? The internet needs some kind of moderator to wipe out all the unused/idle domains so we can start over fresh. Oovoo, Twitter, Bebo, Hulu… nonsensical sounds and words that people have to use because all the regular words are taken up by domain squatting idiots. Not that I’m bitter about nateerickson.com, or anything. But I digress.
Omegle!
We’re coming a long way in social media, but sometimes it’s hard to tell if we’re moving too fast for the “social.” Are we still looking to build relationships, or are we just firing off as many links as quickly as we can before the rest of the clutter catches up? We’ve gone from World Wide Web to 2.0 to 3.0, Twitter became the new Facebook, then Facebook became the new Twitter, and it all changes so fast that you’re never quite sure what you’re “supposed” to be doing online anymore.
Well, Omegle takes all of that and throws it out the window. It’s barely a social networking site, if you can even call it that. It strips these interactions down to their base level — strangers talking to strangers. It’s a chatroom. Are we back to the World Wide Web again?
Omegle is the work of Leif K-Brooks, a teenager from Vermont. Who says teenagers never do anything constructive?
The interface looks like an old instant messenger (you kids remember what that is, right?) window — the only names on the screen are “You” and “Stranger.” Go ahead and talk to some strangers, if you dare. Anonymity does some weird things to people.
It’s interesting because you have the choice to reveal as much or as little about yourself as you want. The conversation can last for 3 hours or 3 seconds. It’s either participant’s call. I tried it out and read some things that made me smile, some things that made me laugh, and some things that made me worry about the future of the human race.
What’s your take? Worth it? What’s the point? Waste of time?
It’s certainly no LinkedIn, but catch the right person at the right time and maybe you can get something valuable.
