Another sneaky feature appears on Plurk.com today; it’s time to search! Yes, Plurk now has a search utility which allows users to search their own timelines, other people’s Plurks and for other humans in Plurkistan. It’s a tiny icon located on the lower right hand corner of your timeline. Read the rest of this entry…
Time for another Plinks Post (Plinks = Plurk Related Links). Todays Plinks will also be discussed on the PlurkCAST, which airs this afternoon at 4:00 PM central time.
Enjoy!
-Plurk & The Blogosphere
Plurk, it’s the newest addiction on the internet. It’s allows people to meet, chat, and develop friendships that otherwise would not be possible. Plurk has allowed me to meet many people from across the world; there is nothing like seeing people from Australian say “good morning” as you Read the rest of this entry…
For those of you who missed it Saturday, I Plurked a picture of me and the significant other Plurking away side by side on Saturday morning. You can see that Plurk and discuss it here.
As a Plurker mentioned in the thread… it is kind of Adorkable. 
If someone requests friendship from you on plurk; why can’t you just accept or reject them as a friend? Why is it that they are considered a fan of yours and possibly forever listed on your page? They never clicked the fan button.
The logic behind the current process is adding a contact makes you a fan of them by default. Isn’t a fan an enthusiastic devotee, admirer or follower? Why are people being associated with this when clicking “Add Friend”? Quite a gap between the two exists; friends look eye to eye while fans look up while…
Take your favorite musicians as an example. If they met you what would they think? Does it matter? Who cares; you’re a fan because you like what they do and that’s why you follow or admire them. In this case that is done by implicitly clicking on the “Follow This Person” button.
Is Plurk’s current system creating a “fans” list? Or a list of people you “don’t care to get to know” or worse; “people who I’m sure will just send me spammy junk”? Why would I ever fan someone when the “base” is comprised of apparently undesirables? The latest algorithm even subtracts karma from you for being rejected as a friend; while awarding karma for new fans... Is this mechanism encouraging or discouraging networking? Where’s the PLURK!? (Peace, Love, Unity, Respect ,Karma)
What is a possible alternative?
If you deny a request that’s it; you’re not friends. If that denied user becomes a fan you get an alert; choose yes or no. If you deny it; they can no longer friend/fan you again. Same rules apply if a follow request is initiated first. No assumptions are made about requesters affinity for the person being added.
To add to this idea when you deny someone as a friend instead of your profile showing “Add as Friend” show “Friend Request Denied”. This “request denied” can also be used on the follow button. At any time you choose to befriend the user simply add them. They accept or deny. The less ambiguity that exists in the relationship; the better.
Plurk is new and I’m sure some things will change and some won’t. I think this is an area that could use some attention. Why do I care? I care because Plurk is better then any other network I’ve tried at actually letting you meet people; not just usernames.
I did ask this question on plurk and as expected got a mixed bag of replies.
So what’s your take on this?
Written by: Bloggeries
I came home from the cottage party ~24 hours later to see the results of the karma experiment. As I was expecting my karma dropped slightly by .13 to 55.11.
At first like most people who see their karma drop for the first time I was slightly confused then realized it only makes sense. The most interesting plurkers have to use it daily because if others browse the most interesting and they haven’t logged in for a while it reflects the activity of the network poorly. Therefore the karma algo would have to factor that in. Others had mentioned it occurring and I now know for myself.
So now we know how high maintenance the relationship is and if we wish to develop it or not is totally our decision.
Written by: Bloggeries
I’ve been a Plurkoholic lately, which is a good thing. But because of the amount of time I’ve spent on Plurk, I’ve found a lot of Plurk features, or lack there of, a bit disconcerting. Granted, Plurk is fairly new and we understand their working on a lot of upgrades and features, but I’m hoping they guys running the show can help us out with some badly needed goodies.
The following is my list:
1) Better Mobile Plurk Access
One of the reason Twitter was so easy for me to use (when it actually worked, that is) is because I used TwitteryBerry for my Blackberry religiously. I had one of my side buttons linked directly to the TwitterBerry application, meaning I could access my Tweet stream with just two clicks. From there it was very easy to navigate to private messages, replies, and update my own stream.
I realize that Twitterberry is a third party application accessing data via API, but that doesn’t change the fact that Twitter is MUCH easier to use via mobile compared to Plurk. In fact Read the rest of this entry…
