Deb from Seattle, Washington, must have been cruising some prior postings on this site, because yesterday she got exercised about some grousing I did — and you did — about MySpace a few weeks (months?) ago.
This is very flattering to me. I like it when people go back and see some of the fun we’ve had together. Remember how mad we all were about the airlines a little while back? How about the tremendous venting that took place about the loss of the Marshall Field department store, whose brand was eradicated by Macy’s? What a surprise that was! Who knew so many people would care about something like that? More recently, a bunch of you guys have gotten into it with each other about Stan O’Neal’s exit package at Merrill, displaying wildly divergent opinions about executive compensation. And then of course there were all of you who joined me in my squirrely feeling about joining a social network.
Deb was not one of them. I didn’t want what she had to say to get buried down there in the timeline, so I’m going to reprint it here.
“Hi Bing,” she writes. “I got turned on to your site from a link that was on Fortune and got interested in all of the reading. Most everyone who has blogged you has posed an opinion…just opinions. Here are some facts for all to think about. I am a regular Myspace fan. I originally had set up an account to check on my children. I got addicted to it. I did not want all of my personal info being shared through the world either. Fact be known that Myspace has settings for the privacy of their users. Only friends of the users may view the profile. All it takes is a little playing around with it to see your many options. Email is no different or insecure than the email addresses through yahoo, or hotmail, etc. one of my children that I gave up for adoption has kept in contact with me over Myspace quite regularly since we live so far apart. I can look at her pics, see her lifestyle, and watch her slide shows.I have my profile set to private and only my kids and close friends (whom I choose) can view my stuff. I have a setting that blocks solicitors and everyone under 18 from contacting me. As I present these facts to you, my opinion about Myspace doesn’t matter here. I am a professional business woman, and college student and have had enough experience with spammers, hackers, nosy people, that I just want to say that there are things people can do to save themselves the crudd that goes on on Myspace if they really wanted to and these bloggers should really check out the facts before posting to millions of people who will read your blogs about how unprivate Myspace is. It is only as unprivate as they make it. I respect everyone’s opinion but when others judge things without looking into the facts, that makes them, well…they don’t look very good on here. It was actually nice reading your blog and seeing the thoughts of others.”
Thanks, Deb, for your passionate and well-informed defense of your online toy.
And thanks to all you guys for your comments and your thoughts. You’re a cranky, disputatious bunch. But hey. I loves ya.
Now get outta here, you knuckleheads!