Facebook Song Facebook is one of the fastest growing and best-known websites to date with more than three hundred million users (nearly as big as the U.S. population), most of which are outside of the United States. Facebook and Facebook Inc. is an on-line destination for not only teenagers but adults alike, and a company, which strives to “connect everyone.”
Facebook is a social networking tool for work or pleasure, which strengthens friendships, reconnects friends or even family members and cuts through social barriers, it is the Web’s “dominant social ecosystem” (Stone). Facebook has unlimited possibilities from allowing friends to send messages, chat, upload photographs, videos, create or join groups and events, play games, share music, send virtual gifts, create applications, advertise, promote businesses, etc. There are even Facebook applications for iPhone and Blackberry, With its endless capabilities, many people are spending countless hours on Facebook. Whether going through pages of photos, visiting personal pages, or not to mention how many times I’ve heard someone remind another to “tag them” in a picture, or seen someone spend an hour on Facebook in class or while they are in the library studying for that big midterm, or how about that person friending me just because we have the same name? Might I also add that “friending” isn’t in the dictionary but has become a word in our day-to-day conversations.
Facebook is more than just a social networking tool, it is an addiction, and it’s like a big party with everyone you know. Facebook is infiltrated with innumerable personalities from the let-me-tell-you-exactly-what-I’m-doing-how-it-makes-me-feel: this person just told us they ate their second bowl of the new honey bunches of oats with pistachios and it was good but not as good as the honey bunches of oats with almonds and now they ran out of organic soy milk …followed by a second post about the long line at the supermarket, even though they are standing in the line for twelve items or less (since they ran out of organic soy milk this morning when they tried the new honey bunches of oats with pistachios). This personality can also fall under the “TMier” telling us about their upset stomach from the milk this morning because oops! They are lactose intolerant. Then of course there is the person who posts comments on those endless updates.
There is also the lurker, who never posts anything but brings up your posts or comments, or friends in conversation. There are people who chronically invite a person to groups or events, which goes in hand with the one who accepts every friend request, group request or invite just so their news feed shows how popular they are (obviously). How about the paparazzo who posted a picture of you from last weeks party making out with that bag of wine but you never approved it, although I’m sure at the time reminded the photographer to “tag me.”
Facebook has gone beyond a social networking system to an addiction, which I have considered eliminating because I don’t really care that Josie just bought a new sweater on sale, meanwhile I am going back and forth between writing this and checking if I’ve been tagged in any pictures from this weekend. Facebook has seeped into every day life, and I don’t think it is going to slow down, but maybe it’s time to assess if you are suffering from Facebook Addiction Disorder?
