I've thought about this too, and in my mental diagram of lj instead of the orbital pattern you have, I have a sort of Venn diagram of overlapping circles. This is because although I have a certain friendslist, each person on that list has a different one, with some common and some different friends. Sometimes I'll follow a comment or a reference and get out of my circle (like now), but it's still sort of related by hops and jumps.
no subject
And I miss USENET.