Ello!

Via Ello

I joined Ello about two weeks ago, and I have yet to get the hang of it. It's bare-bones, with no annoying advertising or like buttons, the latter of which I have found to be rather freeing. It promotes interaction, at least as far as networking sites go, but because it's not really that user-friendly, it's not all that easy to talk to other people. I only follow, like, six people, and my feed is getting crazy enough that I actually fear following any more.

Social networking has become very difficult to navigate. Facebook has changed so much that I have considered deleting my account numerous times, and Tumblr is something that I continuously debate as to whether or not I should return*. Twitter is probably the only platform right now that I am solidly behind, but the 140 character limit can get frustrating, especially when you delve into complicated topics. I'm hoping that Ello isn't going to turn into another Google+ (which I still sporadically update), because the idea behind the site is pretty brilliant: networking without the advertisers. None of this "ranked" or "promoted" bullshit, which is quickly becoming one of my least favorite aspects of Facebook.

I'm going to go ahead and give it a trial run for a few months, so the developers can make adjustments and patches and whatever techie people jargon I'm forgetting. It's still in beta phase, which gives me a little hope that when it's ready for a public launch, a lot of these problems will be resolved. Of course, that will just bring many more because, hey, Murphy's Law, but for now, let's focus on the task at hand: parying that this site doesn't implode, leaving us with an aftertaste of what might have been.

(Oh, and PS! If you have an Ello account, feel free to click above in the first paragraph and friend me! If you need an invite, just comment below or shoot me an email at juniper dot trela at gmail dot com.)

* The answer is probably no, but I could change my mind tomorrow. The last time I updated was last year around this time, and I made a concerted effort for, like, two days?