When Social Networks become a Nuisance
I’ve just logged off Facebook, having wasted nearly forty-five minutes. There were 27 requests asking to be my friend, but I knew less than about half of them. I can’t imagine why the other half would want to be my friends.
There were stupid virtual gifts, offers of a virtual knighthood, adverts for stuff I wouldn’t want in a million years, tedious facile applications and surveys (do I really care what proportion of the brain-dead prefer Pepsi to Coke?) I’ve been shown lists of favourite books, and what passes for music: bands with daft names like Flatulent Freddie and the Snot Nosed Psychopaths droning some tuneless ditty.
Personally, I use Facebook as a private personal network. During the odd break I like to find out how ex-students are getting on with their lives. I’m looking for the odd short message telling me of how their lives/careers are progressing – the odd photo of their families or on vacation is fun. It’s perfectly OK to ask me for a reference (although strangely they seem only come in LinkedIn, not Facebook!) I am not interested in friends of friends; one degree of separation is as far as I want to travel. One aspect of social networks that is often forgotten is exclusivity. Far from inviting everybody in, many network members want to keep everyone else out – and why not?
Yet most of what I see are lists of superficial facts, invites to parties (where they play the junk music), adolescent ‘I hate Manchester United’ jibes shared with the world, and facile comments about ‘what I’m feeling now!’ The scale of garbage postings seems to be increasing exponentially. Don’t people realise that this drivel is being read by HR departments – postings say far more about you than your CV ever does.
How do we filter out this overload? It seems we’ve lost track of what the network is for. If we’re not careful we’ll throw the baby out with the bathwater. I’m already seeing a sharp rise in postings like ‘X is withdrawing from Facebook until further notice.’ This is only to be expected when social networks become a nuisance.
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lol what a bitter bitter article. Facebook is incredible and has allowed me to reconnect w/ people I haven’t heard from for 15 years. Sure, there are some silly annoying things there, but its very very simple to set up your account to block all of that out. if you are that annoyed w/ Facebook you need to learn how to use it properly.
@Aaron Not many think about what bad can happen with them using applications such as Facebook. An educated user can always continue using applications using his/her common sense. However common sense is anything but common.
We all use facebook no matter it has quite a few problems. We are just trying to show users the darker side of phenomena on the Internet. This helps them preparing themselves against bad things that can happen with them!
Hi Aaron
The piece wasn’t meant to sound bitter, just irritated. It was a call for Facebook users to develop a form of etiquette, so that I don’t have to construct various defences. I too love getting in contact with people I knew 40 years ago, and I don’t want to put hurdles in the way that would stop them getting in touch – but people I don’t know, and with whom I have nothing in common, and with who knows what reasons for adding me to their list?
The whole point of a working social network is not just those you let in, but those you keep out.
Some form of self-organising social discipline is needed if we are all to get the most out of Facebook. You are now more than welcome to my Facebook.
Best wishes
Ian
To throw in the development perspective, an etiquette or a practice of sane usage is going to be all the more important as more of these develop. I recall a piece in the last month about the challenges of the ‘social media specialist’ and their sometimes spam-like activity on twitter and/or FB – and how you deal with them w/o causing difficulty. As you say, thought is needed.