Digital Suicide

Have you ever feel bogged down by your digital social life?  Do you want to regain control of your life and meet your real neighbours again?  Well, worry no more!  Introducing (drum roll, please), the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine!!

Since when has assisted suicide become legal?  Only if it’s digital suicide, ridding you of your Web 2.0 life.  The Web 2.0 Suicide Machine guarantees satisfaction.  You just need to give it your username and password, and it will commit digital suicide for you.  So far, it works on four social networks: Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, and Twitter.  According to the website, this is what it will do for you:

Facebook

logging into your account

changing your password and your profile picture

excluding your account from public search

removing all email notifications

removing all your friends

removing all groups you were member of

removing all your wall posts (beta)

joining the group "Social Network Suiciders"

logging out

Myspace

logging into your account

removing all your friends

leaving a status message that you've comitted suicide

logging out

LinkedIn

logging into your account

changing your password and your profile picture

removing all your business connections

logging out

Twitter

logging into your account

changing your password and your profile picture

removing all people you follow

removing all your followers

removing all your tweets

logging out

And you can watch this process happen in real-time if you have the Adobe flash plug-in.   Pretty neat, eh? 

This is a pretty cool concept, but it is pretty ironic.  The Web 2.0 Suicide Machine offers to disconnect you from the digital Web 2.0 world faster than you would be able to otherwise if you manually deleted all of your contacts.  It removes you from all the online communities so you can connect with your real network of friends.  But if you explore the site further, you will come across the Testimonials page.  Here, you can see a picture of the person who has committed digital suicide, the number of friends they lost, the number of tweets they lost, and their last words to the online world.  But isn’t this just another community, itself?  Here we see a group of people who have gathered together around a common belief.  They may not be interacting with each other, but they have come together for a common cause and their legacy remains here. 

I also found it ironic that these people, who no longer want to be a part of the Web 2.0, will use a Web 2.0 innovation to commit suicide.  Wouldn’t it be easier to just close the browser and go outside?  Maybe these people are just trolling, but this Web 2.0 Suicide Machine is a really cool concept and an excellent example of how social media mixes itself with real life.  

Personally, I don’t see myself using the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine anytime soon.  I’m a social media enthusiast.  I love stalking on Facebook, looking at people’s wall-to-wall, checking out their pictures and picture comments.  Sometimes, I even find myself recognizing people that I have seen on Facebook in real life, that I have never actually met in real life before.  Despite my odd behaviour with Facebook, I think that I will be able to tear myself away from Facebook and the Internet if I had to.  But for the people with less self-control, I would recommend the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine and therapy in real life.  

You can check out the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine here.  Happy dying!

Love,

Bonnie and Clyde, signing out one last time.