Thursday, January 29, 2015

What I Don't Understand:


*Pretty much anything to do with computers. I simply cannot process the idea that everything with computers is based on zeroes and ones.This is not logical, says I.



*Facebook. I joined once years ago, and within minutes I was notified that I might want to be friends with so-and-so, who went to my high school. And graduated years ahead of me. No thanks and it creeped me out. I didn't understand then that it wasn't that person himself who was trying to be my friend; it was some computer/mathy algorithm thingy putting us together. I deleted my account the same day I opened it.

A year or so ago I opened a new FB account with a pseudonym, just like famous people might do. (Do they?) I only wanted to see my daughters' photos and news and keep up with my bookclub. But a couple of months ago I decided that using a pseudonym was just silly, and I "changed" my name to my real one, and set tight security, to the extent that I understood the settings, and now I am more confused. I have no idea who the people are that FB says I might be interested in following. Is FB sending MY name out as a sort of potential creepy stalker? I DON'T KNOW.



*Pinterest.  I joined, again---briefly---and I understand that it is a "virtual" bulletin board, but I've never used a real bulletin board, so I just wasn't interested in it.



*Twitter. NO NO NO NO NO! Too much information, and I don't mean the creepy, salacious kind of TMI, just literally TMI. Way too much to read, and I always felt obligated to read everything anyone tweeted. I deleted that account.



*Instagram. My granddaughter created an account for me so that I could see her drawings and photographs and those of my younger daughter. But I have yet to figure out how to see them. I think they invited me or I invited them to my, um, nothing, but so far, no luck in checking out what is there.  

***Followers. I really don't understand this. I am not on Pinterest or Twitter or whatever Google is talking about, but I keep getting notices that I am being followed by so-and-so. What are they following when I don't even post anything? I did google myself once; I have an unusual spelling of both my first and last names so I was easy to find. However, there is one other ME, and she is a physical fitness trainer in New Zealand. I wonder how many people are following her, thinking they are following me, whoever me is since I'm not even on these sites. My niece was following the other me, thinking that it was real me, until I clued her in. 



AND, weirdest of all, I keep getting notices that someone wants to link to me on LinkedIn.am not on LinkedIn and never have been on LinkedIn, so how is this happening?

Oh yeah.  It's that computer/mathy algorithm thingy. That I don't understand.

2 comments:

sallyknit said...

I'm with you!

Shoshanah Marohn said...

This is nice. I'm not the only one! I'm all over everything, and I haven't a clue what I'm doing. Especially with Pinterest and Twitter. What I can't figure out about Twitter is why anyone does it? It is just completely overwhelming. I post a joke there every day, just to try to figure it out.

I just discovered this blog, by the way. Very cool. I have sheep and and I'm a knitter.