Friends = when persons add one another by mutual consent. It can be called friends or buddies or anything, best left to be decided by site admin with a configurable/editable name
Following = is basically not by mutual consent, though I may disallow following in total or cancel or allow someone following me
Friends = Friends (Facebook) = Circles (Google Plus) usually can be regrouped into various subgroups like relatives, batchmates, office workers etc which is visible only to me
On the other hand Followers may not have such grouping system.
Thanks. So Matt, you're saying there are no real "Best Practices" - whatever works for your group is "best."
Kanha - you feel Friends should ALWAYS be reciprocal? (Buddies is a good word, too:) Under what circumstances would you want to turn off the concept of Following/Friends? Do you mean as an Admin, or as a User? As much as I agonize over this relationship thing, I wouldn't want to do away with it!
Ah, Friends. Can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em.
I too have found, in explaining Elgg, that the Google Circles analogy is more easily understood than comparing it to FB or Twitter.
Thanks again for your input! I appreciate your help & time!
I use them as contacts in a contactbook (with friend request) and I use Matt's following plugin next to it to 'just' follow them.
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