I'm confused. People are using it to keep in touch? That means that these people have computers equipped with both audio and video recording devices. Why don't they just video chat? Or record their own stuff and email it?

So you mean now not only do I get to read about other people going to the grocery store, flossing their teeth, 'chilling', making blueberry muffins, or other such drab shit, but now I can actually watch them do it for 12 WHOLE SECONDS!?!?!

Technology just gets lamer and lamer. When the robots become sentient and use poisonous gasses to poison our asses, we will deserve it.

Affirmative.

Or just make youtube videos for each other? This seems the opposite of useful, to me.

This is clogging the interwebs with poo. I need clean pipes to download my stuff from Usenet....

I agree with the emerging sentiment here that this is NOT a very useful tool...

It's the same reason the video phone, whose technology has been available for decades, is not nor nor likely ever to become popular. There are certain message formats for which brevity and simplicity are king, and few people require or want more than that.

When I talk on the phone, I don't want to worry about how my hair looks, if I'm smiling, what's in the background, etc. A voicemail is simple, quick and unobtrusive, and I don't need it to be anymore than that.

Same holds for text messaging, which I love. Simple, to the point, and serves a niche of immediacy without being obtrusive to the end user. I DON'T like the emerging MMS messaging which clutters the simple text message with photos etc.

Sometimes simplicity reigns.

I'll chime in with the rest. I want to see videos that people have created with a little special effort, not just casual "hey there"s. This sounds about as useful as podcasts, i.e., not at all (a normal person can take in information ten times faster and with ten times the comprehension and recall from text than from audio or video).

I was just about to say, "podcasts are useful?"

With all due respect to Warren Ellis, he pretty much masturbates over every new internet social networking mechanism that comes down the line whether it's good or bad. I love the man's writing, but his endorsement of any 'new Facebook' or 'new Twitter' is lost on me.

I have a telephone with a dedicated land line and it works every dang burn time - coming in or going out. Oh, wait - I have a bunch of buggy whips, too. Being passé is such a bummer.

..another toy that helped destroy the elder race of men.

The lack of appreciation for technology among you luddites is amusing. I'd wager that Paul is correct: this service seems like it has the potential to become just as popular as Twitter, which has blown up and is used for far more than was originally intended.

@11

You nailed the just as popular part. You forgot the just as annoying part.

Also, it's not nice to call names, asshole.

Say "YES" to War on Iraq

by Dan Savage
October 2002

"War may be bad for children and other living things, but there are times when peace is worse for children and other living things, and this is one of those times."

"In the meantime, invading and rebuilding Iraq will not only free the Iraqi people, it will also make the Saudis aware of the consequences they face if they continue to oppress their own people while exporting terrorism and terrorists. The War on Iraq will make it clear to our friends and enemies in the Middle East (and elsewhere) that we mean business: Free your people, reform your societies, liberalize, and democratize... or we're going to come over there, remove you from power, free your people, and reform your societies for ourselves