F#^*K Facebook: I Have Enough Friends.
Around a year or so ago, an old friend of mine from high school, whom I hear from hardly ever, sent me an email requesting that I join Facebook. Facebook? I thought, with disdain. Seriously? Isn’t that for like, college kids? I deleted it. Then, a few months ago, a friend of mine who lives here in LA mentioned that she’d just joined Facebook and was having a blast with it. Seriously? I said to her. Facebook? Isn’t that for college kids? She assured me that I would be amazed at how many people our age are on there. Okay, I said, but still. Isn’t it really meant for college kids? I mean, isn’t going on Facebook at our age kind of like going shopping at Forever 21? And do I really want to have to make virtual small talk with every person I’ve ever known in my entire life? She tried to convince me that it wasn’t like that, but I held firm. By mid-summer, however, the pressure was mounting. Suddenly, wherever I went, everyone I knew was talking about Facebook, and I was starting to feel like I was only one who wasn’t in on all of the fun. Okay, okay, I thought. I’ll do it.
I joined during the last few weeks of August – that blissful time of the year between camp and school, when you’re just hanging out with your kids and have nowhere to go and nowhere to be – and almost immediately, I became obsessed. Oh, my God! There’s that cute guy who moved to Ohio in 8th grade! Oh, my God! There’s the girl I used to play with every weekend at the shore! Oh, my God! There’s a group of every person I went to camp with in 1985! I was manic in my Friending, and I often stayed up until one or two in the morning, searching for names I hadn’t thought of in twenty, sometimes thirty years. I posted status updates once, sometimes twice a day – Risa Green is so ready for school to start! Risa Green just cleaned out her car and found three years worth of Cheerios and Goldfish between the seats! Risa Green thinks roasted marshmallows on a chocolate chip cookie are better than roasted marshmallows on a graham cracker! – and all day long, my Blackberry buzzed like a little bee with email notifications of Friend requests and inbox messages.
And then September rolled around, and my life slammed into me like a truck going ninety miles per hour. Now, there was carpool to drive and lunches to make and after school activities to go to. There was homework to supervise and – oh, yeah – a book to finish writing, and dinners to cook and doctors appointments to make, and suddenly, the Friend requests and the in-box messages and the status notifications were all starting to feel like just another chore. You see, I emailed my (real) friend who first dragged me into all of this. It is for college kids. They’re the only ones who have the kind of time for this kind of time suck.
02.12.10
try this:
http://toofacedbook.wordpress.com/
10.10.09
Facebook and other social networking sites are highly illegal, and they endanger many individuals around the globe who have little knowledge of it. Social networking sites spam millions of people daily in the form of invitations which are effectively harassment. Just because you have distributed your email to an individual in the past does not mean that you lose your right to privacy. Some sites like Quechup import address books and spam individuals unknowingly to the registrants. Social networking sites cannot assume that individuals who have not visited their site want to join.
www.impressionsofworldviews.com
07.08.09
I think it is all about a balance between "facebook" and "face to face" time...that's why I just launched a website www.open2conversation.com (it's about the concept of talking, not spending more time on the computer).
I would love some feed back on my idea!
03.28.09
Amen!
03.28.09
Dang! I had to post! I googled how to stop looking at Facebook- you could not have said it better about merging who I am now and who I was in high school! I hate it actually- its like I have to prove something- popularity contest! whatever! I'm canceling- yes it can be good but their seem to be just too many and mostly not grown up people who are 31 who still want to be in high school- so ok- but I don't want that for myself and I find myself thinking about it waaaay to much - and my husband is totally repulsed by my newfound addiction.
10.30.08
I enjoy Facebook; but like everything in life it must be enjoyed in moderation.
It is how I found your site . . . hmmmm?
10.14.08
Right 0n! Thanks for validating. I just cancelled my Facebook. I did it for an old friend whom I haven't seen in years. I think it was more of a popularity contest for her.A day or two after I posted my profile and pictures I felt like some of my closest friends didn't know as much about me as my "Facebook friends".
Besides I am not in highschool anymore.Time to move on. I will admit if you did have friends and family out of state Facebook could be ideal .But for me it was just too much personal info. out there.
10.09.08
I've found them all very useful networking sites, while also giving into a little fun. The apps on facebook are definitely annoying, the twitter 'twitter' is too much and the linkedin discussion boards too irrelevant. It's easy to keep tabs on all your sites when your work life is slow, but when our innevitable crazy-mom times, it's good to just lay low. Your network will still be there when you need 'em.
10.02.08
i have actually found a lot of friends on facebook that i have lost touch with throughout the years... i don't have that much time to look at it but it's fun when i do get a chance... :)
09.19.08
I am an internet marketer and recently launched a blog for my group of hotels. I am supposed to be all over social media, web 2.0, etc.
So I did join LinkedIn and find it useful for keeping up with old colleagues and I'd like to think that I'm the same person now that I was when I began my post college career - so no teenage drama.
Four years ago I spent a few hours designing a MySpace page. When I showed it to my husband he instantly told me that MySpace is for single people or those still caught up in high school. I realized that he was totally right and removed the page immediately. I'm not saying it's bad, but it's just not for me.
Now folks are trying to convince me that Face book is a cross between LinkedIn and MySpace and that my company needs a face book page especially since we have a blog.
I can hardly handle this blog let alone all my incoming email and voicemail. For now, I'm still "opting out" of linked in and MySpace.