I’ll never forget, during one of many fire company related classes we were discussing ‘Tot Finder’ stickers. You know, the ones that you see in Windows so that firefighters know there is a child in that room in case of emergency. They’re good and bad. People know there is a child in that room, at the same time people know there is a child in that room.

I just posted on TechBurgh about a new experiment in which you are able to find bloggers within 30 feet of you using your laptop or mobile device. It got e to thinking on a larger scale.
Would there be advantages to this kind of technology in broader markets?

Of course I got to thinking Emergency Service wise. What if you could find emergency personnel in your area? On the scene of an accident? need help? How about if you’re in town looking for a nice restaurant? maybe you ca hit up some very local knowledge.

I’m sure dating and singles site could find a use for this too.

I know there are web sites doing this but they’re not doing a very good job, surely there’s a better way to do it.

Would you like a device that allows you to find people, locally to you. Would you be interested in knowing who/where people are who have common interests? Could it be more of a danger than anything else?

What areas or fields do you think we could use social locating technology?

Oh, there is coffee too. Lots and lots of coffee, half as many do-nuts as there can be, a third of the muffins there should be and never enough creamer.

Anyway, I was thinking today. This is Social Networking, right? (Brogan, tell me if I’m wrong) There are business transactions, calls for help, finances, investments, and other business done there.
There’s very little to do with Computers, the Internet or IT in general though. In fact wherever possible they try to steer well clear of anything postdating a typewriter and abacus.  
Still though, according to Wikipedia:

A social network is a social structure made of nodes (which are generally individuals or organizations) that are tied by one or more specific types of interdependency, such as values, visions, idea, financial exchange, friends, kinship, dislike, conflict, trade, web links, sexual relations, disease transmission (epidemiology), or airline routes. The resulting structures are often very complex.

I’ve never really been one for ‘networking’, never the ‘social butterfly’, even though I am the founder of an IT Networking Organization but this, I can do.

I don’t even know how I got into this group, it kind of just happened.

This all got me to thinking how now a lot has changed really, well at least between ‘Social Networking’ online and in person.

The idea hasn’t changed, if you know someone who offers a service you recommend them to someone else. If you’re in a group of like-minded individuals then you deal with each other. Because people know people the web spawns, people know each other and circles grow and the network expands.

‘Geeks’ haven’t changed either. I’m talking about that group which I consider myself not a part of. I’m talking about the stereotypical, pocket protector wearing, magic playing, bespectacled, reclusive, greasy, pimpled, unnecessarily long word using, IQ touting…. nerd.

So, where did the online social networking community come from? Social and IT (nerds) never meshed.

What caused a new group to emerge? when did it happen? I know that in Pittsburgh at least, the group of New/Social Media types I know can be as technologically knowledge as some of the nerdiest nerds out there but are nothing like them.

Would you call this one a subculture? it’s hardly an underground movement.

What do you think? Cause of the emergence? when? who and how?