Is everyone listening?

Having to repeat yourself may not be the most annoying thing you ever have to do, but it's up there along with arguing with an idiot and using windows. I find it just as annoying when my friends are scattered over several social networks and I need to get a message to everyone - log on to google plus, write message, log on to twitter, copy and paste, log on to facebook, copy and paste - it's a lot of effort.
Of course, it's always useful to keep your friends in one place, but the next best thing is linking up your accounts.

I use a chrome extension called 'Publish Sync' (although there are many other options). Public sync allows me to link my twitter, facebook and g+, and if I had plurk, sina or tencent I'd have options for those as well. Every time I post to one I'm offered a choice of which other accounts to send it to via check boxes beneath the text field - and of course, my previous choice is remembered so in the majority of cases there's literally no additional work necessary.

The cloud is famously said to bring everyone together - but this has to be carefully balanced with ensuring competition between rival social networking sites. Little things like public sync bridge the gap so that we, the users, get the best of both worlds - publishing to everyone with one click, and choosing our preferred means of social networking. Lucky, lucky us.