Person 2: No :)
Person 1(with a weird looking face): No?! What do you mean by No? Everyone has Facebook!Why don't you?
Virginia Heffernan and Tom Hodgkinson answer this question in their articles that discuss Why people should not have facebook accounts. The articles were published in NewYork Times and in the Guardian; and have succeeded in persuading some people to deactivae their facebook accounts.
Let's start with Virginia Heffernan's article, Facebook Exodus, she starts her article by saying that facebook which is a social network website has a lot of our private information and it does not promise us loyalty forever. And then backs this idea up by presenting reasons and some people's experience with facebook.
Reasons that people quit facebook include, feeling that they have no privacy, feeling that facebook is stocking them, others feel like they are stocking other people on facebook (they felt as though they became so nosy in other people's business), and others just did not like how much time they were spending on facebook. Therefore all decided to quit.
The examples she mentions makes one think about how facebook can turn back on its users and how it may be using us and our personal lives entirely for its own success and growth. Yet, I have personally experienced a lot of good things that make me like facebook, they out weigh what seems to be negative about it.
I am an active person in university, we organize so many events around campus, and to get the dear students involved we use facebook as one of the main means to get in touch with them, and to let them know about the event that is taking place, And indeed so many of them respond and attend events because they found out about the events through facebook. I have heard a lot of students say that they check their facebook more than they check their emails.
In another article, With friends like These, Tom Hodgkinson speaks about how facebook changed the way people socialize, people in the olden days communitcated and socialized face to face while nowadays people would rather spend their weekends behind their desk drinking and connecting with their friends through writing them "ungrammatical facebook comments".
He goes on adding reasons to why he hates facebook, the American company that was created by what he calls "Geeks from California", he criticizes the fact that we gave them our information without knowing if they are reliable or not, we blindly trusted them.
However I would argue that Facebook did not force us to give them our information, there are a lot of options that give us the choice not to share our them or not to make them public. If one does not want their information exposed then simply do not give it!
Ironically, we see some people placing their personal infomation on Facebook on purpose to get attention and feedback from poeple; How many times did we find out about people getting married or engaged from facebook? It is kind of becoming a news social website.
My friend got engaged lately, I told her Congrats on you enagegement, she was like write do not tell me this here....write on my wall! :s
Weird huh?! I understand that point that both authors make about our relationships becoming less intimate and more electronic.
Thank You..
With Love..
its sad how important facebook is in our lives. Its surprising to me about what your friend said about writing your wishes about her engagement on her wall. its funny how "wall" has become more personal than a phone call. I have a 7 year old niece who is crying from the past 2 years to get a facebook account and her mother disapproves. she says all her friends have a facebook account. i was very surprised hearing facebook being popular amongst 5 years old also. Facebook suicide has to wait for a long period of time till it get popular.
ReplyDeletekhushboo uttamchandani (dint put up my name) :S
ReplyDeleteHafia,
ReplyDeleteI agree with you.. it's true that facebook has a lot of options and we are the one to decide whether we want to share our personal informations or not. I started using facebook last year and I'm a very active user. I just add what won't get me in trouble uploading it.
And about your last say, I was with you at that time when she said write it on my wall. It was really weird because in the past people would be upset if you didn't congrats them face to face but now if it is not in facebook.
thanks heeffoo
Ashwaq Hasan
i agree with khushboo that it is sad that we all are addicted to facebook. but it has its own advantages. we can contact our old friends and make new friends as well. we have the choice to add or reject. so if we dont want any person on our facebook, we can simply reject it. the purpose of facebook is to make friends and know what they are interested in and are they single or not. what major they have where do they work or study. this is what college life is. BUT we have privacy settings to limit the access to our page. so thats a good thing.
ReplyDeletealina asif
Hi Haifa,
ReplyDeleteWell done on the clear introduction. If I may add, when I started using facebook, I was about 16? And I never imagined that facebook would save our information so hopefully some young bloods who come across one of our blogs will be careful about what they put on with the notion that what goes on facebook, stays on facebook.
I'm with you on the free advertising for events on facebook. it's great for organising how many people will be there however, not always do those who rsvp as attending come and people tend to get upset if you are a no show.
ps. based on your request, my very first writing pointer for u is read your article twice befoe publishing! well done over all though!
I think what Haifa talked about is straight to the point. Like when she mentioned that facebook has no privacy for people movements and for their connection with other people. I agree on that since there are many stories that prove this point. However, also hacking our facebook also is a reason for people to not even think of creating an account.
ReplyDeleteKhalil Jerdak