chat roulette from Casey Neistat on Vimeo.

JESS3 / The State of The Internet from Jesse Thomas on Vimeo.

Un-friend trend:
It is undeniable that social media has changed the way we interact with friends, co workers and family.
We hasn't felt the burn of seeing a photo of your former flame with their new love, been annoyed with the old classmate who tries to convert you to their religion or political party on their status messages, or at least been solicited to throw sheep at someone?

Some interesting social network stats:

31% of today’s social networkers have only been at it a year or less.
Another 30% have been using social networking sites for one to two years, with the rest having used these sites for at least three years.

Length of time using online social networking sites

Most “Residents” (persona of folks who are avid social networkers) have been using online social networking sites for over three years, significantly longer than other segments.
“Twitterers” are most likely to have used social networking sites for 1-2 years.

75% access social networking sites from home .
- Beresford Research, “Use of Online Social Networks White Paper”, Nov 2009

So while I don’t have the research to back this assertion up – this says to me the early adopters might be looking for some new stuff to play with.

Today’s headline for a San Francisco paper reads: “’Friends’ No More, for some Social Networking has become too much of a good thing”

Anecdotally I can say that even some of the local “social media gurus” are unplugging.
Some companies have even streamlined the process for you and created social media “suicide” apps:

http://www.seppukoo.com/
http://suicidemachine.org/

Click for random Strangers

So where does that leave opportunity? If we have “friended” ourselves to boredom, there's always the kindness of strangers...

Chat Roulette* is an irc type chat channel that allows people to connect with strangers picked at random on open 1:1 video/audio channel.

I am very curious to see how big this gets and I can already see many product, service and entertainment opportunities using this basic platform.

Safe for work articles:
http://nymag.com/news/media/63663/comments.html

http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/cliff-kuang/design-innovation/welcome-weirdest-new-internet-past-time-chat-roulette

Is it possible we are seeing the birth of the next wave of tech mediated social interactions?
And perhaps we are making a sentimental journey to return to the wild west the web once was.

* Warning: a lot of what is on chat roulette is NOT safe for work. It is completely unfiltered, non-edited content. It’s the idea and the platform I wanted to bring to your attention.

Saul Griffith Green Tech from Camille Ricketts on Vimeo.

from 2009 Salone del Mobile, Milano Italia

The Eyewriter from Evan Roth on Vimeo.

Graffiti Analysis (iPhone) - DustTag v1.0 from Evan Roth on Vimeo.