Me, myself and facebook
It’s almost a bit scary how dependent on Facebook we’ve become. IM? Email? What is that? I can’t really fathom how disliked email have become. The purest and simplest form of communication online is treated as if it has Ebola. It doesn’t matter who your email provider is. If you have X and your friend has Y, it’s too easy, no tricks or hacks to send each other a message.
Can you send a message from Identi.ca to Twitter? Can you message someone from Facebook who’s on Diaspora? What if you have have MSN and your friend is on ICQ? Fat chance it will work — unless you get an account with the network you want to send a message to. Do you have that issue with email?
No!
Yet we treat it like it is some super complicated way of communication. It’s so easy to acquire an email account, set it up and use it I won’t bother getting into the details.
So when you tell someone you prefer email over Facebook, it is as if you come from the past. Or some kind of alien planet that uses a really odd way to communicate.
To me, Facebook is too noise. It distracts me too much and in the end, I find it to have no character. I get the same feeling when I read a tabloid newspaper. Feeling all dirty and used like a hooker turning tricks to feed her crack habit. But with Twitter and Shortmail it is straight to the point. No fluff. No gossip.
“Hang on,” you might say, “Facebook isn’t the problem, you’re the problem. It distracts YOU.” Well…I get all fucked up when I take cocaine. By your logic, should I then take more cocaine— more often —to build up a resistance? So instead of getting rid off Facebook, I’m the one that should adapt? I shouldn’t change — for the sake of everyone else? Is that what you are saying?
That is the irony of the majority of Facebook users. Everyone else uses it, so…to fit in, I have to too.
Not anymore. 10 years ago? Most likely and unfortunately.
We are too eager to please everyone else. So much that we forget ourselves. It is so bad that if you try to act on your own, regardless the situation, way too many will gladly call you selfish. Because how dare you have the curage— no one else had — to be different?
How dare you!
But this has made us even more selfish. We’ve become unable to balance working as a group and working as an individual. We only want me to succeed, but never stand out form the group. So instead of behaving like a group, we create small groups and end up being selective with who we socialize with.
Two can play that game!
Thank you Facebook. It was not really that fun while it lasted. I might return, but don’t hold your breath. Because if I return, very few will notice it. Brevity is king! Brevity is the future! Don’t believe me? Then you haven’t read the news in a few years. Most of the time Facebook will get you fired, while Twitter will get you a job.
≤140 @DokterW
≤500 dokterw [at] shortmail [dot] com
