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I haven’t blogged much recently, so I thought I’d share something quickly about something that’s been on my mind. It’s a problem with social media. Perhaps you’ve experienced it too – it’s redundancy. And I mean that in the nicest way possible. And it’s partially my fault. I use Twitter. I use Google Reader. I’m on Facebook. I’m on Friendfeed.

In all of these platforms, people I know, follow, or am friends with send their updates across all their platforms. At first, this was useful – I could see which platforms were being used by which friends. Yet, in an edge case that’s increasingly becoming the norm, I experience instances where someone writes a blog post. Great! I get it in Google Reader because I follow their blog. But then…

- They share their own blog post in Google Reader, which shows up a second time in the “Friends I follow” category.

- The blog post gets noted in Friendfeed.

- Friendfeed updates Twitter and sends a tweet

- The tweet updates Facebook.

One post ends up being shared in 5 different locations. And each time I visit another platform, I see the same update, shared by the same person. In no way can I follow comments on the post, since discussions can happen on any platform – reader, Friendfeed, Twitter, Facebook. Even LinkedIn if you want to take it to the extreme.

Another example I see is on Twitter. Someone influential in my network sends a tweet. About 5 other people end up retweeting the message. While it’s great to see the information being passed on, this is all redundant to me.

In my ideal world, products would offer their own filtering mechanisms. In Twitter’s web interface, I would love to be able to ignore RT’s of people I specify. In Google Reader, I would love a feature that would automatically mark as read a blog post that was already read by me but shared again without any new unique comments.

In my ideal world, someone’s first unique Tweet, Facebook status, Friendfeed update, or blog post would NOT show up in any other interface. It’s fine if you want to share it, and that’s the point of social networks. But as these platforms compete for users, they offer plug-ins and API’s that share information across all networks, making information redunant. I find myself increasingly tired of checking into all of these interfaces to see the same content repeated over and over, trying to find a few unique pieces of information from friends who are (smart enough?) to use only one platform to share what they’re up to.

Sadly, I’m guilty of this too. I’ve linked Facebook/Twitter to my Friendfeed. (Sorry for anyone who follows me there, because I almost never log into Friendfeed to change any settings.) I linked Twitter to Facebook. My original goal was to make it possible for me to update one interface and then reach multiple audiences. In practice and for a blogger, this helps expand your reach, so I do sympathize on why this happens. On the flip side, as a consumer, and ultimately the individual who makes a choice on whether to stick with Google Reader, Facebook, Twitter, Friendfeed, etc (and while you may use multiple platforms, which one to log into first and spend the most time in matters), I’m getting tired of all the duplication.