I was dragged onto fb kicking and screaming by a former co-worker. My picture remained the faceless question mark for months on end. Now I'm connected to 385 people and have emails forwarded to my blackberry - which never leaves my side due to an on-call type job.
COMMUNICATION:
As our book mentions, many aspects of the 4C's overlap. At the very basic level, all four are indeed forms of communication. The basic communication attributes fb provides for me as of late are:
- Reconnecting with old friends and family members
- Taking communication from fb into the real world... ie. attending events I'm invited to, or meeting a long-lost relative via skype (after my poison ivy clears up)
- Realizing how different many of my views are compared to some friends and family
- Wanting to slap people on a regular basis for posting mindless bleh when they are given a chance to have a voice
There are certain friends who post video clips or urls that help spread knowledge about pertinent current events that help me stay in touch and not tune out the rest of the world due to my day-to-day responsibilities. Reminding me I need to be aware of the world around me.
COLLABORATION:
Being in a band is difficult when you all live in the same town, let alone when you are separated by geography. For me, fb allows me to stay in touch almost synchronously with each of my band-mates. We schedule practices, book shows and make overall decisions via fb email all of the time. It's way more organized than when we talk in person. It's documented so we can build upon the discussion and it allows practice time to be about the music... mostly.
CONNECTION:
While I understand security is important, I think some new fb security features cross the line into freaky... I recently noticed several of my friends posting comments... ok, that's normal, but since some of their friends are not my friends... and they've blocked their posts to only be viewed by their friends... it looks like the original poster is having a conversation with him or herself. Clearly they're answering someone, but I can't view the entire conversation.
In the past I may have chosen new friends based on their witty banter or intelligent comments. This stifles my options for adding new friends, pushes me away and ultimately seems to defeat the purpose of the whole social networking aspect of Facebook.
I was slow to come to Facebook, but then new technology including the Internet arrived after I had already established socializing techniques. Originally, the idea of communicating in other than real time person to person situations just seemed wrong. However, when I spent three years in California away from everyone and everything familiar (other than my brother who was very ill) i found that email and IMs were my life saver. Facebook has worked out well -- have found some old friends and even though I am not very active, it is cool to see what people I know are saying.
ReplyDeleteActually I like your older black background, it's much more punk~
ReplyDeleteI sort of feel the same way as you did in terms of Facebook. There is a Chinese "Facebook", I get used to use that. Therefore Facebook makes me feel a little overtaken. I still think if we use all of these social websites, they will waste us a lot of time. You will just loss the sense of time when you use Facebook or Twitter or YouTube or blogs. How to figure this out?
I agree about the increasing security features and updates for Facebook, crossing that Big Brother line. I think my main use of Facebook is to connect with old friends and that is where you can see the real value of such a site.
ReplyDeleteWhat about Facebook stalking? (Or creepin'?) People like to make fun of me that I truly got my Masters in Facebook Stalking (it's true), but I think it does make for interesting conversation on their security features...
ReplyDeleteKosia, my social life was cut off after having a baby, it was nice to find a way to connect to people again. I can see how geography did the same thing for you when you were in Cali.
ReplyDeleteMs.Q, still working on my design. Now you've seen the hippy and the punk side of me. ;)
Pixar Poster, consistency is important. It reminds me of the success of chain stores - people like knowing what to expect when they go to a site, be it in person or on the internet.
MCK, how creepy is it when you have a conversation with someone and they try to tell you something new in their lives and you say, "I know, I saw that on facebook" Um, I mean... no I'm not a creepy stalker.
I love how facebook was once a place to really connect to people, but with it's constant changes it has really let it's main function slide by the waste side.
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