So I will be the first to admit I am completely addicted to Facebook. I can't even say how many times per day I check it (because I can't even admit that to myself), but it's often. Especially when I am working - it's great to distract myself briefly with someones new photos or perusing the new status updates which have come through. With nearly 500 friends it does mean that I miss many of the status updates just due to the sheer volume, but it entertains nonetheless. Of course having that many friends, or "friends" I should say, is part of the issue. How could I possibly have that many friends? I've even culled through and un-friended at least 50 people! I don't even think I know that many people. Do I want that many friends? No. Could I possibly keep in touch with that many people? Hardly. Do I have some voyeuristic urge to look through peoples profiles who I haven't seen in 20 years and didn't even necessarily know or like then? Yes, yes I do. Why? Boredom. Need for distraction. Some desire to see if they seem to be happier than I am. Of course that is utterly ridiculous since the photos people choose to post can hardly be indicative of their mental well-being, or even physical well-being. Who knows how old those photos are? I am curious though. It's the same reason I would go to a high school reunion - this is just one big virtual reunion for the classmates of John Jay.
That's one aspect of it - and then there's the reality that many people choose to post on my wall or send me messages instead of writing me emails anymore. I can't stand that. It's somehow even less personal than email - which in itself as we know is not very personal. People post status updates asking who wants to go to a movie that night or see a show or do some other activity. How would i even necessary see that? With as many "friends" as I have, I can only see the last 30 minutes of status updates at any given time - which frankly makes it not very useful. And the new interface? What a piece of garbage. Whomever took away all of the useful filtering functionality was a complete idiot. I would daresay their user testing group either 1) didn't exist or 2) was also a bunch of idiots. but I digress!
The problem here being my constant need to check facebook. Update my status. Pick a few people and read through their walls and look at their photos. WASTE OF TIME. I mean, with my complete lack of sleep and overabundance of work I still would have to check facebook a couple of times before I went to sleep - even if I was exhausted and had my eyelids closing as I tried to cram in one more wall-to-wall. So, I've decided I need to back off. It's so unhealthy as to be pathetic, really. At first I thought I wouldn't be able to do it (talk about a real addiction!) but then I realized it's actually easier than getting over most addictions. All I need to do is not log in. I'll admit the first couple of days were hard. Especially being on vacation now with little to do at night - but the relief I felt at not needing to use it far outweighed my bits of curiosity on what people were up to. It's been 3 days now going on 4 - with one last status update and I think I'm over the worst of the withdrawal. I'm going to need to be one of those people who logs in once a month, misses out on 20 events because people no longer invite you to things outside of facebook, and be okay with that. The Luddite in me is really, really happy with this decision. This is bringing much more of a separation of work and life as well - my life needs to be as far away from the computer as possible since my work is married to the computer. No PDA's, no email-ready devices, no computer except for work and the paltry amount of personal email I receive (none on most days). Living for me just can't be done through a computer, I need to remember that and keep my distance. I will always be a letter writing, phone calling friend at heart and hopefully in practice.
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