QuaziMoto

I have been on Facebook since its inception and over the years I had accumulated somewhere north of 800 or 900 “friends”.    The problem I have with Facebook is:

1)  It substitutes breadth for depth.

The interactions I’ve seen have little to no substance and although you remain in touch, I find that contact to be shallow and fundamentally meaningless.  I mean lets face it - there’s only so much you can say in an IM or a ‘post’.   Are you really having in depth, meaninginful conversations?   Basically these contacts are ‘pings’ or ‘updates’ and quick highs.

2) This lack of substantive depth to Facebook relationships provides a user with a false sense of importance and security.

Sure it’s nice to have 800 Facebook friends and be invited to a million parties or events but do you ever actually attend?   Are those friends really there for you and are you really ‘there’ for them?   It sure does make you think there’s a big safety net out there even if there is not.

I believe it was Chris Rock who said “You’re only as loyal as your options.”  Well Facebook warps a persons sense of options while at the same time providing a false picture of those options as being happy, fun and joyful while the reality could be something quite different.    String together a series of joyful anecdotes or smiley pictures and it’s easy to get the impression that people are having an amazing time and have very little hardship they are dealing with.

3) It devalues our time and we’re simply not present.

Can you watch a movie on your couch w/o checking Facebook or having an IM conversation?   Do you get home and the first thing you do is check Facebook?    I sit behind a computer all day so it made sense that I would take some time to check Facebook but what happens when you get home and you ignore your family or regular friends because you want to see whats going on in Facebook?    Guess what - nothing is going on in Facebook!     Its mental drivel akin to watching a highly edited reality tv show where everyone is happy and excited all the time.    Its not real.      Real is picking up a phone or carving out a few hours to hang out with someone (and not checking Facebook at the same time).    Every minute you spend on a social network is a minute your not investing in the people that give a shit enough to spend their most precious commodity with you - time.

If you’d rather be on Facebook than spend time with me what does that say about me..where am I on the list of priorities?   It’s a bit insulting and yes I did it for years like a rat in a lab experiment.

I guess the question is do you prioritize connectedness over quality.   It’s been suggested that humans thrive on a biological need for gossip.   That it used to act as an early warning, planning and strategy skill.   Maybe true and maybe why there is such incredible adoption to this kind of technology but what about my final concern with Social Networking.

4) The safety of communication.

Having been a part of the early days of IRC and other instant messaging platforms one early lesson most of us learned is that people will say things from the safety of their living rooms and computer screens that they would NEVER say to someone in person.    We all did it back then and now over 100 million+ people are piling onto Facebook and have access to one another and I would guess are likely to say things that they wouldnt IRL (in real life).   Anger, flirtations….the best and worst of who we are all at the tip of your fingertips.

I’m not suggesting regulating or banning these types of technologies (the same rules above apply to IM, email & text messaging imo!)  but I am saying that our brains are wired for optimism and we don’t always take the time to understand the negative effects they have on our relationships and how it changes our priorities and the things we value.