Public activity

Dear American: This letter might come to you as a surprise since we have not known ourselves before. My name is Henry Paulson, and I am Ministry of the Treasury of the Republic of America. It is with belief and trust that I send you this obvious and sensitive business proposal to enable me and my colleagues remit the sum of USD$700 billion (Seven Hundred Billion United States Dollars Only) into your account. However, I would wish to receive your personal assurance that you would not sit on the money when it goes into your account. More importantly, you keep confidential this transaction, in order not to tarnish the confidence repose in the officials involved in this transaction. My country has had a crisis that has caused the immediate need for large transfer of funds of 700 billion dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would be most profitable to you. via d o t - c o m a (italy)

For those interested in sociological patterns within Facebook, Professor Jason Hoffman over at Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society has been running some tests on the same group of students over the last 4 years (about as longitudinal of a study as you’re going to get on Facebook at this point, given that the site is just over 4 years old) and has posted a video of his presentation here.