Facebook-The Behemoth

[Tim Ingram]

Interesting discussion because there are nuances. The most important question of all is 'do those who use the SRGC Forum also join the SRGC and/or financially contribute to the running of the Forum, and even more - if they live in Scotland - contribute directly to running the Society and its events and groups? This is the big problem (and wonder) of the Internet - it gives you access to so much without necessarily contributing. You could say this is all simply about the quality of information shared anywhere on the web, rather like the information that sits in books on your bookshelf, because it is up to the user to judge the quality. Facebook is more like a 'relay station' that can point you in the right direction (if the right direction is given), and - as Maggi says - can be valuable if that right direction is to the Societies and Groups we belong to and care for. In that sense it can be capitalised on by the individual rather than the organisation that runs it... but it does have downsides quite apart from the ways that organisation uses personal information. But neither the Internet or Facebook are likely to go away and it's hard to see the SRGC and AGS and other specialist societies thriving unless they encompass the Social Media and make it obvious the very practical values that they share, not least the Alpine Shows and support for specialist nurseries!

[David Sellars]

The first forum I joined was Alpine-L back around the turn of the century. The database of responses is still available on-line and are searchable with Google. Alpine-L had many North American users but Alpine-L was essentially killed off by the NARGS Forum which took away the main Alpine-L participants. Alpine-L struggled on for a while but is now essentially dormant.

The NARGS Forum was very active when it was first introduced but many NARGS Forum users have since migrated to Facebook.  This I believe is the main reason for the demise of the NARGS Forum though there were other factors. Now we hear that some SRGC Forum users are moving to Facebook. It would be tragic if the pervasiveness of Facebook detracted from the quality of the SRGC Forum. Facebook has the capacity to eat everything in its path. But maybe in 20 years time something will come along that will swallow Facebook.

[David Nicholson]

Read, mark, learn and inwardly digest!

http://www.businessinsider.com/10-reasons-to-delete-your-facebook-account-2010-5?IR=T

[Tim Ingram]

Maybe conversation is dead David and we are all addicts now to the social media and sound-bites. I think that is probably true to an extent - much depends on the quality and stimulation and accuracy of the conversation and whether you feel stimulated or depressed by it. The interesting thing about the Internet is that it can have something of the intellectual freedom of a University and the way it does this is by connectivity. You will probably be as frustrated as I have been by the relative lack of conversation on another specialist garden society website. Curiously that led me to the NARGS Forum, where I came across some really interesting gardeners, and here on the SRGC even more so, and then Facebook where that happened even more in a rather different way. But it does come back to how much anyone is prepared to financially support the AGS, NARGS and SRGC, and these I do. Facebook costs nothing except their accessing of your intellectual property (so to speak), and coming from a scientific background I believe in intellectual property being freely exchanged. So I use Facebook to turn its gaze on the specialist garden societies that I really believe in, and to come across some really interesting people who otherwise I would never have 'met'. But that doesn't mean I don't share many of your concerns, in the same way that journalism becomes subsumed by the short term nature of the social media. What the societies do, which Facebook (or the Internet in general) can never supplant is that very personal sharing of our plants and gardens which we do day to day by actually contributing to them. Facebook is a bit like that section that used to be at the beginning of the AGS Bulletin of notes from different gardeners under the title of various semi-parasitic plants (Pedicularis, Rhinanthus, Castilleja) - much of it is ephemeral but it can lead on to something of more substance when you contribute positively to the societies you love.

[David Nicholson]

Steady, safe and secure, you could let your grandma (or grandad) loose on the SRGC Forum

Unlike................................................................................

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/15/business/facebook-advertising-anti-semitism.html

[David Nicholson]

Facebook can't hide behind algorithms...............

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-41358078

[Great Moravian]

I boycott facebook. For many other reasons that cannot be published.

[Maggi Young]

About posting photos - I know the ease of loading pix to facebook is very tempting - along with all those "like" ticks - but  the SRGC Forum has undergone some changes recently and if using the  (attachimg=1)  code - with the square brackets (rather than the ones I've used to allow you to see without confusing the system with code) it is possible to attach  larger photo sizes which will be automatically resized to the page and open in the  text box.
I don't suggest  using huge  multi-MB file sizes - but  one can post much larger photos than previously - plus the size that photos are resized to on Facebook will transfer here perfectly.
 A couple of random examples .....






The first photo above was originally 2592  x 3888 pixels and over 2MB and the 2nd was 1280  x 960  and 325KB  - they are now  466 x 700 and 52.8KB and 900 x 675 and 163 KB  !

 So things are easier here  now than you might expect!

[ChrisB]

Ok, here goes, I'll try uploading

[ChrisB]

Came on small and sideways ....  ?

[ChrisB]

Don't understand what to do Maggi

[fermi de Sousa]

Came on small and sideways ....  ?

Maybe 'cos that's how they grow in the wild?
 
Photographing it on the kitchen bench makes it look like an African Violet!
cheers
fermi

[ranunculus]

Testing, testing ... simply testing, testing ...

[ranunculus]

Gloating, gloating ... simply gloating, gloating.

[Jan Tholhuijsen]

Test, these photos are very large 3.6mb 4600 x 3500 pixels approximately. (and it works perfectly)
Oxalis perdicaria
Clematis viticella 'Purpurea Plena Elegans'