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This is by far the most interesting thing I've seen on Hacker News in weeks.
It is/was interesting which surprised me - I thought the title was just awful.
Agreed - I only clicked on it because I was in one of those time wasting moods and had clicked through everything that looked interesting.

It's considerations like those discussed in the article which make me think that, while companies like facebook aren't going away... and while the web will indeed continue to be more social - the actual value proposition of being able to connect in more and more ways to people that I have met continues to reduce in my eye.

They talk about how it's social recommendations that you really trust the most, so they see this great marketing opportunity. But it's becoming increasingly obvious to me that most of my friends provide pretty woeful information compared to what I can get through some skilled use of google and what the author describes in this article. That's increasingly going to be the way of things because by necessity - one's social group can only store and compare a tiny amount of information. As more people realise this, so too will the value of a social recommendation decline.

Tools that allow you to find better quality of information will win on the web. I think social is a red-herring in that respect.