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Update on Dunbars Number
Social media may get us more connected but they still haven't made us increase the size of our social network. Social media may create a huge potential but the neocortex is still the limit.
Facebook inhouse sociologist Cameron Marlow crunched a few numbers to test Dunbar's thesis and he found out that despite the possibilities and accessibiity, the circle of our interactions is relatively small and stable.
We are not afraid of intimacy at least, as we have no problems with streaming our lived through updates, photos to broad audience, but we are not keen on investing in creating more meaningful interactions.
I wonder whether we don't use the whole potential social media are
giving us because we can't process it or rather cause aren't interested
in interacting with too many people.
Read the whole article on The Economist - Primates on Facebook
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Do you recall Dunbar's number that describes the the number of people with whom one can maintain social relationships: knows who each person is and how that person relates to others. Dunbar's number is 150. It is interesting to see the number of friends average user has on Facebook.
Average user has 120 friends on Facebook.
It is defintely below 150 . Not everyone is Alpha Friender. Some are just use social networks to maintain and extend their offline relationships.
