Chronicles of Brevity: Facebook
The power of networking is nothing to be taken lightly. The information age definitely has lubricated the networking process simply by making individuals more available. I believe each network has its place but no network has managed to do what facebook has in the last ten years.
Facebook is so pervasive that people are often gawked at for not having an account. It has become a large part of our interaction with other human beings and has changed the way socializing works. A key talking point when marketing a new cell phone is its ability to connect you to facebook and other networks. We are told to “stay connected” to what is going on in our circles by always having facebook available but in actuality no connection is ever really made on facebook.
Barring its instant messaging ability facebook does not really inform you of what is going on in a given “friend’s” life. Apart from seeing what song he or she is listening to or what small goal they have in mind for the day, you’re not really going to get much insight on a person’s life.
For example. If you see someone post something like “Life is so loathesome. I don’t know how much more of this I can take,” you have reason to believe a couple of things about this post.
- The person is not really depressed and doing this for attention, because someone who is truly downtrodden would not seek the sympathy comments that will follow. This will be confirmed if you see “thanks for the kind comments, guys! I needed it!” in future statuses.
- If the person is feeling depressed they’re telling the wrong people about it.
This is true because nothing real ever happens on facebook. The only way to truly connect with an individual is to actually contact them. Comments are usually just a weak currency of attention.
Here’s a second example. My birthday is today. I log onto facebook and see forty happy birthday posts on my wall.
What has happened here? Nothing.
Most of the people who wished you a happy birthday were only reminded to do so because of facebook’s convenient birthday reminder feature. There’s nothing wrong with using this functionality to remember your friend’s birthdays, (I use it all the time) but when you combine that feature with an obligatory happy birthday post things become a little murky. Am I to feel like these people actually cared to wish me a happy birthday? Its too hard to say.
I told a friend that if I got a bunch of happy birthday posts on my wall I’m not going to post the traditional “thanks for all the birthday wishes” status thereafter. I told him that I would only thank those who made an effort to contact me either through email, telephone or instant message (and those who put effort into their wall posts). That way everyone who deserved to be thanked would be thanked and those who were just doing their birthday rounds would be forced to contact me if they’re seeking acknowledgement.
Now you may say I’m looking to far into this, and believe me a lot of people have told me I am, but allow me to finish my thought. If I don’t post a “thank you for the birthday wishes” status what is going to happen? Is someone going to feel unappreciated and call me to give me a piece of their mind? How crazy would they look for doing that? And on the other hand, how many people who didn’t care to call, IM, text or email are going to be paying that much attention to my statuses to even notice that I didn’t do the thank you post? The answer is zero. And that is so because nothing real ever happens on facebook. That is the reality.
People are getting into fights, relationships are becoming rocky, and every 30 seconds an argument is occurring over facebook. Facebook can only allow you to connect superficially to a large amount of people. Connect too deeply to the superficial and it allows for petty, shallow confrontations with people who may not even matter to you.
Networking is one of the most powerful things in life. It is more important that you make quality connections rather than a large quantity of comments, and likes.
This is a more in depth look at something I began in a piece I wrote called A Generation of Brevity. Read here if you’re interested on the background.
http://theironlion.tumblr.com/post/974245867/a-generation-of-brevity
