The Collected Thoughts of the Zappe Family

Well I finally broke down and got an account on Facebook a while back. I didn't really want a Facebook page. I'm not really big on the whole social networking thing. I had a theory going at the time that it is a very shallow way of interacting with people. I don't really like that kind of interaction. I prefer to have meaningful interactions with people who are my friends in real life and not just my "friends" on Facebook. The persistent nagging of friends, wanting access to some things that apparently Facebook controls, and finally wanting to correspond with someone (whom I could only correspond with on Facebook) pushed me into doing it. It was really the last one that pushed me over. There was a blog done by a girl with a beautiful baby girl with anencephaly (who passed away recently unfortunately). She had to shut down her e mail because she was getting so much hate mail (another blog all together). She started using Facebook because she could control who had access and sent her stuff. I felt very strongly that I needed to correspond with this woman and offer her what I could in the way of prayers and support. So I swallowed it and signed up. So far my experience has been interesting.

Do I like Facebook?

Well yes and no. It's a love/ hate relationship. I like that I am able to interact with my friends more often. I like that my daughters godfather can see pictures that I downloaded of her. I like playing Scrabble with my husband. I like that it's a another way to communicate with my sister in law and oldest niece. I hate that there are plenty of times when I feel like I'm not having meaningful interaction with my friends. For example one of my friends recently moved from Florida to New York. She used Mobile Facebook to report her experience in driving up there. Is it really meaningful that I clicked on the like option when she reported good travels? Wouldn't it have been more meaningful to talk to her about her fears, concerns, and excitement about the move? But I don't find myself doing that much in a public forum where six other people see and comment also. It's like small talk. I'm an introvert, so I'm not real big on small talk. I have to work harder to have that meaningful interaction. I don't like the twelve thousand quizzes and advertisements. It's fun to do a quiz once in a while, but it drives a person crazy after a while (especially since it accesses all the information in your profile and is basically marketing research). I don't like the fifty e mails I get telling me that someone else commented on my friends status.

Do I really buy into the random person sending a friend request is your friend?

No, most definitely not. Again I think all the random and constant small talk is shallow. So do I think that I made a lifelong friend with the guy from Alaska who's "just looking" for friendships, no. I suppose it's theoretically possible, but I find it highly unlikely. Honestly I couldn't really tell you about the social networking aspect, as far as befriending strangers goes anyway. I've set up my profile so you cannot access it unless you are my friend. I post things about my family. My family is very important to me, especially my children. I protect them fiercely. So I can't actually allow strangers to have access to it. That being said I have a mere 10 friends (but I'm actually very happy about that).

Do I contact people I knew in first grade?

Not in this lifetime. Honestly here's how I look at it. Being a child or a teenager was not the pinnacle of my existence. I was an annoying and boring child. I was an obnoxious teenager. So really the girl I was best friends with in third grade or my first boyfriend in high school are not people that I'm really interested in having relationships with now (unless by chance they're people I've maintained relationships with previously). That doesn't mean that it's not okay for anyone else to do so, that's just my preference. Again I'd like to seek out meaningful relationships.

Do I spend all day on Facebook?

No, I really can't. I have to take care of the kids and the house. I couldn't in my wildest dreams, nor would I want to. I usually have a window open in the background to it for the purpose of playing Scrabble with my husband. I've seen lots of people who are on a lot. It's not really a replacement for adult interaction that's for sure (although I suspect there are plenty of people that use it as such).

Do I like the IM feature?

Supposedly being able to IM your friends is one of the cooler things about Facebook. I don't have time per say to converse most of the time. Facebook's IM pretty much sucks. I was constantly being dropped or my friends were being dropped durning a conversation. I finally routed all my Facebook contacts through to Adium and it works better. I don't really appreciate the fact that Facebook randomly show's me as online even though I've selected to be offline. I feel bad when my friends want to talk over IM and I really can't. A lot of times I end up doing it anyway because I do have some guilt about not having time to talk to them in person or otherwise. Ultimately I have to pay attention to my kids though. Especially since my son is a fearless climber who feels the need to "give" objects to his younger sister (you know clock her in the head with them).

Facebook has been exactly what I thought it would oddly enough. Go Figure. I suspect that at some point companies will have policies about their employees Facebook pages (especially in professions where aspects of an employees private life could affect what the public thinks about a company). That's if it isn't happening already. Facebook has become a part of our society in a very odd way. I'm a private person for the most part, so I don't get the thrill out of adding forty new friends a day that other people get. I appreciate that it's a way to keep the communication going with my real life friends and family. It's just a little hard to stomach some of the other aspects of it. So for being a program that basically uses you for marketing research, it is what it is. I don't think I'll let my kids use it, but I'll probably keep using it. It's definitely an interesting study in human behavior at the very least.