The Awl is kind of hilarious and charming and wry and all those things you look for in a good time-killing website. Token staff Irish guy explains some of the lesser-known ridiculous Irish viral trends in a five-part series. This week: Irish Rap.

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Garbage-ologist, Robin Nagle, is the staff anthropologist at the New York City Department of Sanitation. Why might they need to keep an anthropologist on staff, you ask? Because, “Every single thing you see is future trash. Everything.”  In The Believer’s interview with her she discusses the possibility of a Museum of Sanitation in NYC (among other things) which sounds totally weird and fascinating.

What would a homeless guy do with a credit card? What a great question! A Canadian journalist did a little experiment and the results are, at times, surprising.

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Merle Haggard was a badass. Hands down. Terry Gross knows this better than anyone. I just love listening to nerdly NPR folks talk to grizzled old men about escaping prison 17 times. Thank you Country Music Week.

Aimless meandering around the web can lead to some really pleasant or, more often, disturbing distractions. Our most recent find falls into the first category. Earth Album combines a GoogleEarth format with Flikr content. Peruse the Earth map, pick a country/state/city/neighborhood, and see what kind of stunning photography is coming out of said location. It’s really fascinating and completely attention consuming and there’s something about it that reminds us of old sci-fi movies’ visions of the way information will be consumed in the future (or, more recently/specifically, the way The Fifth Element portrays it). Just click on a country you maybe didn’t realize was in South America and discover that it is, in fact, home to countless iconic nature scenes and imagery you’ve seen your whole life, but could never find on a map.

Social media, social media, social media. Everybody has to have it whether they know what it is or not (and after that last post you’d better have it down). Too often, however, companies’ social media efforts are slapdash and result in a poorly maintained  facebook page with sporadic news updates no one really cares about. So, how refreshing is this social media effort from Lionsgate promoting the new Exorcism movie? I’ve been waiting to see some interesting use of ChatRoulette and this is the first notable campaign to pop on my radar. And it couldn’t be a more perfect venue to promote  a movie like The Last Exorcism, which undoubtably depends heavily on teenage male ticket-buyers who are, undoubtably, constantly trolling for digital squirrel via ChatRoulette. The looks on their faces are just priceless.

If you’re at all like the rest of us, except for me because it’s my job, then keeping up with new social networking tools is like middle school all over again. You’re trying to be cool and know what’s cool before everyone else knows that you don’t know what’s cool when no one actually knows what’s cool until something is mysteriously and ubiquitously declared “cool” and by the time you find out nobody cares because now it’s not cool anymore. Phew. Anyhow, I’m here to help. I’ve dedicated my superior brainpower to combing every square inch of the web for the newest, most creative and, above all, most useful social networking tools on the block, all broken down to their simplest form. Here are 12 tools to ensure you’re never left in the lurch, or alone at lunch, again.

Let’s begin with the basics.

Arguably the granddaddy of this kind of thing, Facebook came to be during a time when many other fledgling networks with similar intentions were scrapping for a foothold in the social network market. Through extensive Faustian bargaining and no shortage of luck, Facebook beat popular controversy to rise above all other networks and exist in the minds of many as the premiere social network. As I’m sure a great number of you know, the concept is simple: a user creates his or her own page containing as much personal information as they wish. They then “friend” other users who created similar pages, enabling users to keep in touch across the great distances of life and thus creating a web of users, or a “social network”, in the process. Ta-da.

The much-maligned Twitter is another keystone in the intricate and continuing construction of the world of social networks.  We’ve all heard the words “tweet”, “tweeted”, “retweeted” and “following” or “follower” dropped into casual conversation, but if you’re unfamiliar to Twitter you probably don’t understand why the people around you are either cringing, or the one talking. The concept behind twitter is even simpler than Facebook. A user starts a profile, invites other users to “follow” their profile, perhaps chooses to “follow” other users’ profiles in the process, and then posts “tweets”, or text of 140 characters or less, onto their profile. Typical “tweets” range from a detailed description of your lunch to more creative applications like a fictional short story or the musings of a famous fictional character like Darth Vader. When you become more experienced with Twitter, there are some difficult intricacies such as hash tags and directional tweeting (@someone), but let’s keep it simple, OK?

Now onto more advanced options.

Foursquare’s been getting a lot of press lately. I’ve heard people calling it a “bundler”, a “meeter”, “bings for boy scouts” and there’s something about a badge? The real deal is pretty simple: Foursquare is a web and mobile-based application where users “check-in” at a place (AKA push a button saying “I’m here right now”), “ping” their friends to say they’re there and occasionally win badges for being there or being there a whole bunch of times, like the frequent-shopper card of life.

Bebo is sort of like Facebook. Each user gets a personal, customizable page, but it’s not at all like Facebook in the sense that it’s actually flexible. Bebo is like a collection of personal blogs, on which the user can share text, video, audio, participatory content like questionnaires other users can answer and whatever. Put your blog, Facebook page, iPod, dreams and girlie-boyfriend-quiz-mag-of choice in a blender = Bebo.

Ning is a little confusing, confusing in the way that a ball of pure light suspended in space is confusing. Ning allows users to create their own social networks. That means exactly what it says. Users are encouraged to create their own social networks around shared interests using their own visual design, customizable features and member information. This is the true spirit of the Internet, especially good for online cults and people who really want everyone to know about their cat but have no one to listen.

Formspring.me is one of my favorites on today’s list. Formspring.me is a question and answer website, plain and simple. Users set up a profile page, on which any other user can ask them questions, anonymously or not, and post comments. The questions and the user’s answers are then posted on the user’s profile page. So if you have, like, a totally huge crush on this guy but, like, you’re too shy to give him a note that says, like, “Do you, like, like me? Circle Yes or No.” or you’re in a crowded car and with your boy DeRon and he totally farts and you know he farted but he denies it, just ask him.

Failin.gs is a profoundly important social network, and a lot like Formspring.me, partially because it works on a similar principal, partially because it’s downright Shakespearean and partially because it gets real brutal real fast. Yes, Failin.gs is the Iago of social networks. Users signs up, fill out a short profile, and invite other users to leave anonymous criticism, ridicule or innocent hate speech by posting an open question or tantalizing sentence fragment like, “I had no idea….” It reminds me a little of tee-ball. Swift is the booty, speedy is the prey.

Off the bat, you get the right idea with RecreateMyNight. It sounds like a big, satiny safety net for blackout drunks and it absolutely is. This magical, seemingly million-handed operation RecreateMyNight culls from other social networks to somehow amass photos, texts, status updates and numerous other crumbs of information about one particularly noteworthy night out in order to map the party out from start to finish. RMN was founded by a group of engineers, which tells me one thing: engineers will go to great lengths to learn how to party.

Hootsuite falls more onto the business side of things than, say, RecreateMyNight does. It serves primarily as a tool rather than a network itself. In signing up, an account is created that allows the user to manage all of their social networks from one place. Particularly good for teams and fields like marketing, Hootsuite applies Google Analytics-style data management to the user’s dashboard of networks to chart their respective success. This is pretty convenient for nerds like me but also a potential messenger of a harsh reality.

Diaspora* calls themselves “the privacy aware, personally controlled, do-it-all, open source social network.” So what exactly does that mean? Well, it’s actually very difficult to find out. Diaspora*, one month into it’s infancy, began as a reaction against the intrusive nature of Facebook. Created by four very enthusiastic and very dedicated computer nerds, the literature on their “project”, as they call it, reads like tech speak but when you get them all to settle down and just talk, things like this come out: “Diaspora aims to be a distributed network, where totally separate computers connect to each other directly, will let us connect without surrendering our privacy. We call these computers ‘seeds’. A seed is owned by you and hosted by you, or on a rented server. Once it has been set up, the seed will aggregate all of your information: your Facebook profile, tweets, anything. We are designing an easily extendable plug-in framework for Diaspora, so that whenever newfangled content gets invented, it will be auto-magically integrated into every seed.” Yah, I get it. I think.

For some, GoogleBuzz is dusty old news. Whether it’s fast-approaching adult diapers or not, it’s more or less a fresh face for the lot of us. Launched in May of this year, GoogleBuzz is much like your standard social network in which a user can post pictures, notes, videos, all kinds of content but in Buzz the posts are organized in “conversations” taking place between a user and friends of that user. Buzz integrates a ton of other social networks like Twitter etc. to essentially create a giant dialogue between the user and whomever else they want while inserting into the mix every user’s choice of their participation across a variety of networks, because sitting around a table with your friends and talking about your twitter feeds is dumb when you don’t have to. Actually, it’s dumb either way.

FriendFeed is much like Diaspora* and a few other of the sites above in the sense that it is an “aggregator” or a central site that combines the content from all your other satellite social networks. What makes FriendFeed unique is that it all collects relevant information from across the web and presents it along side your network data so the next time your tweet about steak or Justin Bieber, which you all do and you know it, you won’t have to wonder about the environmental implications of your grass-fed beef addiction or whether or not Bieber’s feeling a tad concussed from that flying water bottle.

Vinehub is yet another aggregator, because, in the Internet age, we need a million billion of everything to feel satisfied and tended to. But, the major difference between Vinehub and most other aggregators is that most aggregators don’t let you participate with your information within a specific network. Say you receive an update from Facebook in your Vinehub account. Turns out Betty totally “liked” the picture you posted of that dandy apple crisp you just baked. Well, if you want to comment, on most aggregators you have to go to Facebook, find your picture and comment. With Vinehub, you don’t have to. You can do it right from Vinehub. But, alas, Vinehub is also a little glitchy, as it’s still in beta. Unfortunately, all your pastry-and-baked-goods-based conversation will require just a little bit more effort than necessary to execute until all the bugs are ironed out.

LinkedIn is the Facebook of business. Rather than volunteering personal information like favorite movies, TV shows, interests and activities, LinkedIn invites its users to upload their resumes, work samples, and to create “connections” (act as references) with other users on the site with whom they have previously worked. Putting a potential end to dreadful office mixers, the site creates a web of users who know and trust each other in business. Employers can also list available jobs and the unemployed can search the “connections” of a prospective employer for any mutual “connections” who may as a bridge between the two. LinkedIn is also available as a mobile application, for those who wish to quit, regret it, grovel, and be re-hired on the fly, all in the span of five drinks.

Everyone, whether or not they were, or are, actually dorky enough to have one, knows the reference: “the little black book”. This is the little black book of the internet age. Whether you choose to use it as more of a rolodex or a comprehensive list of partners in past and potential future transgressions, Plaxo enables the user to create a list of all of their contacts, the details of which can be changed and updated across the platform in real time, meaning when you change your phone number in the hope that the weird guy you met at that National Filing and Organizational Association Conference in Tulsa stops calling you, Plaxo automatically changes your contact number for every user who has you in their address book, saving everyone a lot of Wite-Out.

GU is a very, very ambitious permutation of the classic social network formula. GU touts its mission thusly: “GORILLA isn’t about gathering friends or collecting followers. It’s about real engagements…evolving the social platform by integrating creative solutions around a sophisticated predictive analysis technology system.” Maybe this is just my own association, but something about this reminds me of that guy you know who knows he’s really smart but doesn’t know if everyone else knows yet and so must assure them all of his superior intelligence. Regardless of who may or may not love the sound of their own voice, or its look on paper, their aim when put in layman’s terms is pretty interesting. GU intends to redefine social media and networks in a way that allows the user to control they way they are approached by media and what media to which they are exposed. In other words, rather than being bombarded with ads and brands, the network itself keeps all of that at bay until the users themselves choose to vote a specific “acceptable’ brand into the network. The purpose of this ostracism is to inspire the user to think about how brands are using social media and networks, how they are planting their ideas into the everyday life of the user, and to ultimately create “a new generation of media consumers…demanding content the way we want it, when we want it and how we want it.”

This I threw in just for fun because it’s amazing that it even exists, or is allowed to. Please Rob Me claims their mission is to “raise awareness about over-sharing”. What it actually does is provide a list of all the empty, unattended houses it is aware of as a potential burgling tool (and lesson to you, I guess). Please Rob Me uses Twitter, Foursquare and a bunch of other networks to determine using every dumbass “I’m-at-the-Mall-and-I-bought-a-shirt-and-I’m-eating-Sbarro’s-and-OMG-I’m-having-so-fun-I-won’t-be-home-ALL-day” update that highlight what users are and are not home and at what address. While their charmingly unkempt cartoon of a striped burglar in a bandit mask evokes nostalgia for the times of simpler, more charismatic Hamburglar-type crooks with dollar-signs on their loot sacks, the reality is that there are probably some really scary, tech-savvy home invaders out there just waiting to burgle the shit out of your quaint little bungalow while you’re busy humming a tune at the local Trader Joe’s trying to decide which organic pesto is right for you.

So there you have it. All the aggregators, dashboards, bundlers and generally frivolous time wasters you could ever want, boiled down and stewed a tasty little noggin-broth for easy digestion. Use them freely, but use them properly. The Hamburglar knows where you live.

It’s fascinating what has the power to draw a crowd. On one hand we have tens of thousands of people streaming videos of dads getting kicked in the balls and awkward teens dancing awkwardly in their parents’ basements with hilarious results. Then, on the other, we have charming, inspiring, little artistic films of spoken poetry from Nova Scotia nearing the million views mark.

Does it remind anyone else of a Michel Gondry film? Love that guy.

I bet you’re sitting at your computer right now imagining that beautiful postcard worthy scene from Sunday night’s episode of Mad Men where Don Draper drives down the PCH, wind in his hair, smirk on his face, booze in his belly, and you’re wondering to yourself “Self, how have those nogginheads managed to last 3 weeks without mentioning Mad Men once?”. Well self, it has been an exercise in great discipline and restraint to say the least fueled by a dash of fear of not being able to do the show justice in one piddly little fan post.

That being said, has anyone noticed these miniseries-like Mad Men spoof ads coming from Unilever? The first week it was a strange Dove ad where, gasp, the secretary has an idea for a women’s product and the most recent installment tackles Breyers ice cream (see below). Every week they’ll roll at a new ad featuring a different iconic Unilever brand–namely Dove, Breyers, Hellman’s, Klondike, Suave and Vaseline.

They’re strange and super corny, but also intriguing in an odd hard-to-put-your-finger-on-it kind of way. At least they’re taking a risk? Mad Men has a history of attracting experimental and innovative advertising (we’re quite fond of the company history tid bits between commercials), but the jury is still out on Unilever’s attempt at branded entertainment. If you can call it that.

The concept is smart and simple, create a conversation with an already knowledgable audience about things they don’t already know. Eventually they will be covering important people and institutions in politics, media, culture and business, but for now the focus is all on culture. They’re calling it beta mode, but it hardly feels unfinished.

Their concept is clear and their business model is refreshing: “The premise of Capital is that it is possible for a news website to do well by being good” (aka not just rack up the page views with slapped out stories of the latest Lady Gaga who-ha slip). What a novel concept! Really, it is. So far digital success has been determined by metrics and page views–a system easily manipulated by clogging your text with irrelevant keywords, categories, and tags. It’s slimy business and creates a whole lot of garbage, but unfortunately it gets the job done (if the job is proving that X number of people clicked on your link).

We’re anxious to see if a focus on quality content can attract the same kind of advertising dollars as the tragic Perez Hilton machine. (It’s been working for Current TV, right?) Fingers crossed.

Flipbook is a new iPad app that basically creates a magazine all about you and the things your friends are into. It organizes and updates their suggestions in real time, making it easy to search for that perfect time killer. Kind of really awesome.

Science geeks and the young-at-heart, you might want to sit down for this one. Chicago’s Museum of Science and Industry (that 14 acre reason field trips to Chicago were the highlight of your grade school life) has announced they’re looking for a roommate. Breathe. The winner of Month at the Museum will eat, sleep, and breathe science for one whole month all while living among the exhibits. How cool is that? The winner must document their experiences via blogs/Twitter/yadda yadda and receives $10,000 at the end of the experiment. Personally, I’ve wanted to live inside a museum ever since I read The Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler as a kid, a burning desire which was only further fueled by that scene in The Royal Tenenbaums and was later brought to a tipping point with the launch of the Night at the Museum movies. So, feel free to enter–I like a little healthy competition–but don’t get your hopes up. Come October 20th I’ll be curled up in that cozy little replica of the the human heart and you’ll be reading my Twitter feed. Suckers.

Since childhood, we’ve been strongly advised against, if not completely forbidden from, talking to strangers. They’re scary, have candy, and are invariably a threat to you for reasons beyond your ability to comprehend. So we stay away, or are locked in the minivan away. But as we get older, there’s rebellion. The itch for independence and to be left to your own devices becomes strong, which, for a while at least, means constantly saying no to old instincts and being compulsively irresponsible. So, naturally, we talk to strangers. A lot of them. All the time.

And it works. Nothing bad happens. We’re amazed. Curiosity abounds. There’s a swell of new friends. Doors open. Horizons expand. Other clichés occur, and it stops, well, never. Eventually, we find that’s the way of adulthood: talking to strangers, networking with strangers, appealing to strangers. It goes from a banned and, reputed by our parents to be, horrible activity to a necessary tool for navigating life, like drinking.

And like most awesome things that we grow to love, there comes a point where doing it in the flesh of real everyday life isn’t enough. It must transcend. It must become virtual. It must be on the Internet.

Unless you’re a dog, performance artist, desperate exhibitionist or a 16 year-old girl, chances are you haven’t heard of Chatroulette. If you are any of these things, except for a dog, chances are a large percentage of the population wants nothing to do with you.

The Chatroulette concept is simple: strangers talking with strangers, hearkening back to the days of the Internet’s infancy and the chat room. You go to the website and you’re in. No username. No sign up. You’re instantly connected, aurally and visually, to a complete stranger. It’s kind of like Skype but with all ten thousand Chatroulette users at any given time distributed across a wheel ala The Price is Right and then spun for your amusement. You going get a lot of pennies (blank screens), nickels (still photos) and dimes (amateur pornographers), but every once in a while, you hit ONE DOLLAR!!! and you’re in the showcase showdown.

Let me show you what I mean.

Take this guy:

WHAT? Brilliant.

And this guy:

Nicely done.

And whatever this is:

That looks like the most fun ever.

What’s the moral of story, you ask? Well, I don’t really know. I know that Chatroulette is a lot of fun. So is talking to strangers. I also know that you’re likely to see a lot of really disgusting self-gratification if you decide to try your chatroulette chances anytime later than early afternoon. So beware, but also don’t, because Chatroulette is what life’s about. Not all the self-gratification, but taking chances and weeding out the duds from the gems. There are a lot of them out there. They all communicate differently and some of them are doing really amazing things, on or off of Chatroulette. The next time you meet a stranger, don’t eat his candy. Don’t run either. Put on your Walt Whitman hat, or more literally a spiderman mask…

…and ask them if they know any stupid human tricks. What they show you might speak volumes.