I've deleted two of my Friends. That's a very emotive way of putting it, isn't it? It makes me sound like something out of 'Blade Runner'. Thing is, one of them had no activity in 312 days, and another had, as far as I can tell, never read anything I'd written and has a weblog which has so little in common with mine that I'd never read it either. I comment rarely but I do keep in touch with what people post, but not in this instance, and it seemed rather pointless to keep this person on my list. It almost seemed disrespectful to the rest of you to retain someone so not attuned to the general ambience.

However, I'm not sure what the form is here. When someone sends you an invitation you get to weigh it up, look at their weblog, consider the issue. When you delete them, bam they're gone. It's a particularly impersonal way to conduct oneself (on what is, though many delude themselves otherwise, a thoroughly impersonal medium). I can't help thinking it might be nice to have a halfway point - when you're thinking of deleting someone, a little window could come up into which you could type "Look, I'm not sure this is really working out... I feel like we've grown apart... It's not you, it's me..." (Apologies for my appropriation of break-up cliches - I've never actually split up with anybody, so I can't draw on personal experience.)

I really ought to be trying to acquire more friends, bearing in mind the utterly pointless piece of promotion I'm going to execute in a forthcoming posting, rather than indulging in this act of wanton recision. Never mind though. It feels good to cleanse. Who will be next for my cyber-scythe? Perhaps I should go the whole hog and start trimming you down one by one, Agatha Christie style. I could whittle it down person by person, ending up with a sole Friend who, to complete the artistic vision, I would probably have to actually murder.

This possibly isn't the best way to encourage people to read my weblog.