Poll/discussion: friends-of-friends

[elusiveat]

One of the shifts in internet culture that has occurred over the past ten to fifteen years is the degree to which people are willing to make their ideas public. This is notable on Dreamwidth, where a lot of accounts are locked down entirely, and it can be hard to make new connections (certainly harder than it used to be on Livejournal).

An idea I've heard kicked around as a possible middle ground for privacy would be to allow a privacy level that was visible to people trusted by the people you trust, or possibly separated by more degrees of separation, something you might call a "friends-of-friends" access level (though the "friends" nomenclature presents problems of its own). I believe this exact setting exists (or existed) on Facebook, but with the number and (number of different types) of people I had on *my* Facebook friends list, I regarded that option as essentially meaningless, so never used it.

The situation might be different on Dreamwidth or similar platforms.

What do you think?

Poll #21013 friends-of-friends

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: Access List, participants: 28

If Dreamwidth offered a friends-of-friends access level, would you use it?

Yes
6 (21.4%)

No
9 (32.1%)

Maybe
13 (46.4%)

Mu
0 (0.0%)

Do you think a friends-of-friends access level would be a good idea?

Yes
13 (48.1%)

No
4 (14.8%)

Maybe
9 (33.3%)

Mu
1 (3.7%)

Discuss.

Comments

[elusiveat]

My main reservation is that I don't think there is any kind of agreement on what kind of a relationship qualifies a person to be on an access list.

[artan]

Which is a good point, since I have had friend-of-friend people who I wouldn't really trust with day-to-day competence or politeness.

There is the possible option of friend-of-friend with quiet blacklist?

Friend-of-friend does allow easier perusal for broadening social contact networks, so as an option for a security level makes sense. It's not like it would have to be mandatory.

[someonefromthewater]

Dreamwidth already has a blacklist feature; though right now it just blocks comments and PMs. With a security level like this it'd probably get a lot more use.

[sparr]

Proposal:

1) Quick way to see who your friend is that has this person as a friend such that they are your friend-of-friend. LinkedIn has this, to show you the network links between you and another person.

2) Option to have some people as a friend but not include their friends in your FoF list. This would allow you to filter out some connections from people who are too liberal in their connecting.

[rialian]

===It would be nice to have the option, but yeah...I suspect that these days it would go into dogpile city very easily if the friends did not have a reasonable cohort. (sad, tired chuckle)