1: Comments.

isnt it weird how people have these quasi private conversations in public? and how thats almost the norm now? i seem to remember on Friendster they were called "testimonials" or something, and the idea was that strangers would see your page and hear lovely things about you. on myspace its technically "X has posted a new comment ABOUT you" so its weird that its 99% of the time a fractured part of a conversation or an e-flyer. and then with facebook its accepted that it's a public conversation, hence the "wall-to-wall" view.

so why do people do it? is it just territorial pissings? would you choose to have a conversation with someone youre sort of seeing on a wall/comments box rather than a private message to make it clear to other potential doers of them that you got there first?

2: messaging
Why don't people just email eachother?