The entire concept of online social networking is genius. Facebook was established as a way for a user to show the people they know a little about themselves; whether it be pictures, opinions, or their interests in general. Basically, it's a short-hand version of your own blog, but more emphasis on knowing the person behind the blog (the profile). More often than not, the person is already going to know the user in some sort of personal-physical connection anyways.
I love Facebook. I think it's an amazing device, but (without getting into any of the privacy concerns) I feel like there are a few elements that scare me.
To begin, it's the inability to control what photos are online of yourself. Sure, when a photo of you is "tagged" you can simply "untag" yourself as in the photo, but it is still there. You're probably asking yourself, 'so what? Big Fuckin' deal.'
The issue is in the fact that our entire lives are becoming digitally stored onto a server that is not owned by any of us. As soon as the images are uploaded, they are owned by another person (in the context of business law - a "person" meaning 'entity'). One of the best aspects about growing up was the family photo album. It was a sacred place to reflect, reminisce, and remember. It's not necessarily that I'm opposed to the digital storing of photos (not at all, less waste), but I feel like life is sped up through the constant need to share photos during social events, and those moments lose their sacredness when a digital photo is available to so many people at any given moment via a social networking site. Digital cameras are always on someone, within a group, in nearly every social setting; usually on their phone. When life is experienced through capturing ever winking moment through a lens as opposed to living it, are you ever actually living it?
There's a theory that life feels like it speeds up as you age because of the repetition of your daily activities. It's the theory that years and days feel shorter as they pass, and become convoluted, because we experience more similar days as we age. It's a theory, but I believe it. It's along the lines that when you're busy at work, your work day feels much shorter. We've all been there!
There's no doubt in my mind that Facebook is addictive. As a Facebook user, I know that it's not difficult to lose an hour, or even two or three hours, browsing and reading up on your "friends," or even news on the bands you "like" in a single day. Before bed a few nights ago, I was thinking about how much I was on Facebook that day. And while I never actually stay on the site for over 5-10 minutes in a given visit, I totaled up the visits and time I spent; my best estimation was roughly 10-15, 5-10 minute visits. I thought, 'damn,' that's a lot! I didn't realize it, but of the 15 or so hours I was up that day, I spent [possibly] 2-3 hours on Facebook. And I thought about how many times a week I did that. I realized that it's possible that I do that 5 days a week (usually Monday-Fridays). Then I asked myself another question. How was my day/life different because I dedicated this time to "social networking?" None.
There was nothing I read or discovered on Facebook that day, or any other day I could remember, that altered my life. All I was doing was adding repitition to my increasingly repetitive life. So I closed my account. Could I have simply just limited my visits? Maybe. But the truth is, Facebook is only a click away anytime I have my laptop on. It was becoming routine that when I turned on my computer - I'd strike the "F" key in the web address bar - "Facebook.com" would auto-fill - I'd hit "enter." On. I discovered this was an issue after I closed my account. The first 10 times or so when I turned on my computer (and it's still happening occasionally), I'd go through this process until I hit the Facebook homepage where it asked me to sign up for an account. That's how much of a staple Facebook had become in my life. To spend that much of my time on something that had no implications on my life is absurd. I'll also add that this isn't just a personal issue with Facebook. I know lots of people who are/were just like me...and it's a large part for the reason the site exploded in the first place.
This is only one side of my reasoning for closing my Facebook account. Aside from the fact that Mark Zuckerberg is an extreme asshole, there's privacy concerns, and that Goldman Sachs and Russian billionaires are becoming suitors for ownership, there are several reason why I made my decision. I won't go into anymore of them though.
Will my account be closed forever? I don't know. I'll be the first to admit I tend to flip-flop on things like this often, but this time, I really did feel positive about closing it when I discovered that visiting Facebook had become a process of powering on my computer. Life is short enough, and I'd like to limit the monotony in some of my daily routines. If anyhting else, a long break from Facebook might allow me to open an account one day with it being more of something I check on a weekly basis as opposed to a daily basis. But for now, the best way of dealing with it (for me) was to simply close it.
As I said before, I love what Facebook is. It's awesome. But it's becoming far too big for it's own good.
My two postscripts
1) Visit The Time Hack (which I should post as it's own post). I'm going to go ahead and post what the site reads verbatim instead of attempting to describe the project in my own words:
"The Time Hack is an experiment aimed at exploring whether our perception of time is influenced by our actions.
The year-long project aims to test whether time itself is flexible and whether our brains measure time differently than the clocks around us.
Research suggests a person’s perception of how much time has passed between two points and how well memories are recorded onto an individual’s brain are partially dependent on the amount of new experiences that person has during any given day.
Experts argue that when one engages in a new experience, that person’s perception of time differs from when that individual engages in a mundane or repetitive task.
The Time Hack aims to explore these two ideas.
Each day, I engage in a new experience to understand how my perception of time speeds and slows in relation to each event. Can I accurately gauge how long each new experience lasted? Do I remember the details of the new experiences more accurately than repetitive events during the day?
Through this website, I collect data by pitting recorded times and footage of each experience against time estimates and written accounts of what I believe took place during each event."
2) Watch The Social Network. It's very good. It's difficult to decipher how much of the story is exactly the way it occured, but the concept and way the site caught on was very telling about the Generation Xers, Millenials, and beyond.
***UPDATE***(1.24.11) - I'm back on Facebook. That lasted long, eh?
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