What can add more sunshine to your day than finding out that a marginal friend of yours that you haven’t seen since high school is “eating seafood gumbo”? How about reading that someone you know is “watching Boomerang-loooove this movie”? That just sends tingles down your spine, doesn’t it?
Well, thanks to Mark Zuckerburg and his Harvard homies, you now have the ability to exchange countless volumes of otherwise inane and mundane information for FREE.
Initially designed as a way for college students to communicate and know a little more about one another, Facebook has exploded into an international phenomenon. But why?
Whatever happened to the wise old adage “Don’t put your business in the streets”? Hell. Not only is everyone’s business in the streets, but it is on the Information SuperHighway doing 150 with no brakes.
Maybe I’m just a private person, but I don’t feel the need to tell the world about every meal or subsequent bowel movement. Other than announcing my blogs, I think I’ve posted fewer than five status updates. But that’s just me.
I’m just not sure what exactly compels otherwise sane human beings to spend countless hours uploading pictures of their sister’s C-section or debating for hours about the best Baldwin brother or which Sex & The City character they are most alike. I’m a little Miranda mixed with a dash of Samantha.
I understand if you’re a model or actress or whack-ass rapper trying to promote yourself. Then, Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, YouTube or whatever other outlet you can find makes sense. But for the average Joe or Joanne…come on!
How much time is actually spent on Facebook, when we could be doing things like…living? How many books could you have read during your FB time? How many classes could you have taken? The gym? A yoga class? Museum, anyone? Time with FAMILY? Naa, none of those things are important. You have to let everyone know that you Like The Flinstones and that you are "Thinking of that someone special smiley–face smiley-face you know who you are wink."
I do understand that this social media phenomenon is a great way to keep up with friends. Hell, I joined Facebook about a year ago at the behest of a few of my friends that I play eternal games of phone tag with. And on occasion, I’ll browse through a friend’s vacation pics or snapshots of their kids and think how blessed they are to have children and how blessed I am not to have any. However, I would be okay if they suddenly banned Facebook from the Internet. I would just go back to thinking, I wonder how old what’s his name is doing.
When I joined Facebook, a friend of mine commented that she thought I was too cool to be a part of it all. I guess I’m not as cool as she or I thought. I’m still a helluva lot cooler than many of the folks on FB. And if you ever catch me on Twitter, then you can stab me with a flash drive.
For all of you Facebook junkies out there, there is hope. It’s called GET A HOBBY. You could be the next great novelist of our generation. But if you spend all of your time cyber-stalking your ex or baking cakes in Café World, you may be depriving the world of your great gifts. And that's just sad.
3 comments:
LOL! No one uploaded pics of their sister's c-section.......or, did they? :-/ Seriously??
Borderline humor-anger, in you I sense....
Are you a tad-bit frustrated?
I am guilty of random updates, none as bad as a"....subsequent bowel movement" and I don't feel the need to do one everyday, or every other hour. HOWEVER, for those of us who find time to read(which I do), go out with friends, interact with family & friends, and have hobbies(eating, shopping, helping the needy?), FB is kind of like a peep-show. I rarely watch TV(except AFV with family), so I guess it fills that time slot for me, albeit broken into little snapshots as opposed to an hour-long session.
I enjoy playing games, not the farm crap, but the thinking games, and I have FUN!!
Don't know if I'm a junkie, but I definitely am a serial "like-comment"er because I believe the world needs my opinion. I also LOVE sharing the awesomeness of my children with folks I know, especially since they're sooooooooo far away :-P
RE: "....or whack-ass rapper trying to promote yourself." Not nice......give them a chance, maybe one day they'll blow up, like one of your favorites. They could be the next Plies or Gucci(Burrrrrr!)
As much as you may try to fight it, social networking is here to stay. Exhibit A. . .Mark's story is being turned into a movie: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ppamk0iTCQ8
Yeah, I know all about the movie. And trust, social is here to stay and it's going to explode to some degrees that we probably can't imagine. I'm just saying, keep some things private while we still can. And the poor libraries would probably shut down if they didn't offer free internet access for the facebook addicts.
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