The Many Electronic Friends That We Have (Week 3)

There are many times that we are on Facebook/Twitter/Myspace/Tumblr and we decide to browse to the thousand of friends that we have on our social networking sites.. Okay, I jest. I only have around 400 friends on Facebook and I think it is already too much for me to handle. 

This is my Friend Network that I managed to get from a website that Com240 has directed me to in the previous semesters.

My network is not interesting, which is what I would like. I prefer a clean cut network, and this perhaps is the only thing that surprised me – that my networks are not as confusing as I thought them out to be – that most people in my networks are made up of strong ties, without much connectors to each group. My Facebook activities are rather mundane seeing as I have not many activities as compared to my peers, similar to realizing that my network is not interesting; I am surprised that my Facebook is so clean cut. There are instances that I would just log into Facebook to be a “lurker”, and perhaps my time spent as a “lurker” has made me forget the fact that I have not been as active – posting of statuses/photos/links – as I am active as a “lurker”.

Well. we all know that everyone needs social networking to interact with their friends or to create "bonds" - yes, however flimsy they are - to maintain future networking purposes. Coming from someone who only has that many friends on Facebook... I believe that social networking sites are good only if you are a believer of having many flimsy connections.

And I am unfortunately not a believer of having many acquaintances for the sake of having a pretty Facebook page. There are so many social problems to deal with when you expose more than what you are supposed to on social networking sites, its almost akin to placing yourself up on a platform where everyone is allowed to bitch about you.. and YOU WOULDN'T KNOW IT. Just look at the poor case of Canadian Teen Amanda Todd, a poor victimized girl of Facebook, who eventually committed suicide after posting up her story on YouTube (a popular video sharing site).

This is her original video, can you believe that people still continued to bully her on Facebook after this incident? Which had ultimately led to her cracking and committing suicide.





Is social networking really just about maintaining friendships and creating new bonds? Since by the social penetration theory. we all know that relationsla bonds do not acquire themselves immediately following the acceptance of a "Friend Request".

Kinda like this image, where there are hundreds of "friends" writing on your Facebook Wall wishing you something along the lines of  "happy birthday pretty! Have a good bithday!"  "Happy birthday! Have a good day and may your wishes come true." Seriously though, how many of those people actually remembered that it was your birthday if not for that niggling little notification at the top of their Facebook homepage?

Yes, you could be like that girl in that picture, and remove your birthday notification from Facebook. But I can honestly tell you that no one would remember your birthday, other than your family, boyfriend/girlfriend, and your best friend from when you were a kid.

Social networking is almost a farce, a facade where everyone gets to be "friends" with each other on the surface. When in reality, social networking really requires you to be able to sustain those relationships with real life interactions.

And everyone, let's not forget about the terrible social/psychological problems you might have due to the overuse of social networking sites.