Effin Facebook
I've wanted to talk about facebook for quite some time now. Just haven't had the time to blog about it since i was busy with 2 of my essays that were due last Friday. Got them in on time and i've already gotten one back. Happy with the result. Still waiting on the stupid doco one... will see what happens.
Anyway, life'll be busy soon... 3 3rd year films coming up... Was asked to be camera assistant/clapper on the first (titled My Son, My Boy-shooting from the 20th-24th of Sept); Gaffing assistant aka lighting assistant on the second one (titled In Self Defense-shooting from the 26th of Sept-1st of Oct); and second camera assist on the third (titled i don't know what yet-shooting from the 3rd-10th of Oct). I decided today to let go of 1 cos 3 consecutive shooting weeks will not be good for my studies or my health. haha... so i gave the second one to Reina, my japanese friend doing the same course in the same year as i am, we've been in the same production groups since first year first sem. Haha... And is so far my closest friend in the course. Have been trying to get her some contacts cos she's good at what she does, so i figured why not...
So... back to the main topic... facebook... facebook facebook facebook. Recent events have just begged for me to write about it.
I'm proud to say don't have bloody facebook. And I definitely don't have its counterparts, bloody friendster or bloody myspace either. I realise most of my friends and family probably do have one or the other or two out of three or all three... And i'm not writing this to offend anyone, what i'm about to say are just my thoughts on these sites, or rather "communities", as they've been referred to as such and why they completely piss me off. And to save my fingers more typing, i'll talk more specifically about facebook since it's the most popular these days. If you're a staunch facebooker, friendster fiend or myspace case, then you may not want to read on, it's entirely up to you.
Right, so much to say. Where should i start?
Should probably lay out why I can't stand facebook (3 main reasons):
-it's impersonal
-it's such an artificial way to keep in touch (despite what people say)
-it's contrived and therefore self-indulgent
the IMPERSONAL part
Anyone who knows me would know that i'm quite a private person, i usually prefer hanging out with one, two, three people at most... unless of course it's the utmost gang... or a group of my cousins... or girls from my senior 3 TTSS class when i'm back in KK, but other than that, i find that i'm more comfortable hanging out and talking crap with a smaller group as opposed to a big one. It's more private and personal and you can actually have REAL conversations... not just the surface how-are-you-how-have-you-been-just-trying-to-make-conversation stuff. So that's mainly what puts me off this type of "networking" sites. I refuse to believe that this is the best way to communicate. Whatever happened to phone calls? If you're overseas... Ok... why don't you try writing a letter? E-mail? Skype? MSN? These are far better ways of communicating that show how much you care and that you are making an effort and want to keep in touch.
Another reason why it's impersonal is cos your so-called "conversations" can be seen and read by anyone, if not the whole conversation, then at least half of what you said or what the other person said, depending on who you've "added as a friend" or worse, it can be read by any stranger if your "profile" is set to go public. I find it supremely stupid to put personal information like address, e-mail address, number etc on sites like these, especially if your "profile" is open to the public. This might be overly cautious, but don't deny that it can't happen--serial killers, stalkers... whoever... can harass you any time.
Again, my close friends would know how much i used to complain about friendster and how people just add anyone who asks... including people that they don't know... and some stories i've heard really make me laugh... like some 'fat hiao' girl having three different friendster accounts or something cos she keeps "adding" people that ask her to saying she's cute or sexy or pretty or whatever... How.... what's the word?... artificial!!!! And so what if you have a hundred friends, five hundred friends or a thousand. The real question is how many friends do you really have? I probably only have a handful of real friends (can count them with my fingers and toes; could be less, i don't know). The rest are just friends you meet once in awhile who have separate lives and are not in your "circle"; hi-bye friends or mere acquaintances. And i really don't see the point in "adding" these people in the first place, and i certainly don't make an effort to keep in touch with them, some are just fake, some are fun to hang out with once in awhile but not all the time, some you don't get along with all that well and tend to stay on superficial/surface-type topics everytime you meet, and others you just don't care about or don't like very much (mostly cos they're superficial).
Anyway, what's ridiculous about sites like facebook is that you add and add and add whoever the hell you meet that has facebook. At uni i always hear people asking other people after they've just met them and have talked for like 10 mins, "do you have facebook?" And everytime single time i hear this i roll my eyes... And everytime someone asks me i say "HELL NO!" or just NO if it's someone i don't know very well. Haha.
My friends who have facebook or friendster always tell me, "you don't have to add everyone, just your friends". And i always say, "yeah true, but no... still not doing it, i prefer a more personal way of staying in touch."
which leads me to...
the ARTIFICIAL WAY OF KEEPING IN TOUCH part
Lots of other people who have tried to push me to join facebook have said, "it's networking ma..." and again, i always say, "yes, but so what?"
If you're talking about film and tv networking, i've been told of a professional website that is only for people in the industry. I'd much rather join that. And if you're telling me other professions such as doctors, lawyers, engineers, architects etc have professional sites too, then great! Join those! If not, then well, there are other ways of "networking", there will always be someone you know who knows someone who knows someone else that can hook you up with a job or at least an interview. So why fret? Don't use the excuse of "networking" to justify bloody facebook/friendster/myspace. I'd rather people just tell me that they're "sam bat". Now, THAT i would believe. And dare i say that is the only thing that drives these sites and is the reason for their popularity--the busy-body, gossipy human nature. As far as I know and from what I have seen (my sisters, close friends, etc that have facebook, well especially my sisters) spend shitloads of time on facebook. What do they do on it? Update their own profile, upload pictures, look through other people's profiles, pictures, comments, write some comments on people's crap, join fan groups of shows, stars, whatever and give virtual gifts or do virtual stuff that really has no purpose if you think about it (how do i know? cos i see my sis doing it and sometimes i get called to see stuff on facebook about my sister's friends and whatever they're gossiping about). Another conversation i often hear of around uni is...
A: "do you know so and so?"
B: "no."
A: "you don't? oh, he's such a...."
or
"really? she's a..." (AND THE ENDS OF THESE SENTENCES ARE RARELY
SOMETHING NICE OR GOOD ABOUT THE PERSON, IT'S ALL
GOSSIP)
A: "he's/she's on my facebook, you should go check him/her out."
Anyway, my point here is that none of this stuff is personal no matter what you say or do on the site itself. And you often see artificial, again very surface-type conversations or worse things like flirting going on. Be aware people, anyone of your added so-called "friends" can read your private conversations (or called "walls") on freakin facebook, so what the hell is so private about it? MSN people! If you want to ask how someone is and want a straight personal answer, why don't you drop him/her a line? "hey, how are you?" would do just fine in my opinion. They're not online when you are? Fine! It's simple, an offline message would be nice too.
But i suppose there are people that want to be their connections and conversations to be known. Why? I really don't know and i don't see the point. But for these people, facebook is fan-freakin-tastic. Probably want to show how sociable they are or how many "friends" they have. Anyway, this leads me to my final point...
the CONTRIVED, SELF-INDUGENT part
All the information people put on facebook and is what they WANT other people to know about themselves, it's specifically filtered information for the "general public", it is......... contrived.
Why do people have to publicly announce their likes, dislikes, mottos, personality (i'm pretty sure there's such a thing to fill in). It's ridiculous. If you really want to get to know a person, get to know them! Don't read their bloody profile! All that's on it is what they want you to hear about them, it's what they claim they live by, it's what they think about themselves... it's all so bloody self-indulgent. Me... Me... Me... For all to see... I don't understand this culture, this mindset, this information overload, this dumbing down of communication. It really annoys me that people are so self-indulgent, just reminds me of those self-indulgent, up-themselves Hollywood directors. They're one in the same. Nowadays, everyone is so concerned with their "virtual" selves and "virtual" image and "virtual" social lives that they forget they have a life outside of facebook. There's plenty healthier more useful things to do.
I understand if you're 40 and not married and desperately want to find a "soulmate"... this display of personal information would go very well on a dating site. But this habit of "me on display" or "me on sale" has just become so pervasive on the internet now and all i can say is that people need to get a life or at least grow some feelings. What happened to truthful, heart-to-heart conversations and binding friendships? Is this what our generation has left? A site full of people you don't really know that continues to expand through interpersonal links that make relationships less personal?
Ugh... And don't even get me started on the display pictures/portraits/in some cases, headshots/studio photographs that people use for their "profile pic". And the tons and tons of albums of their personal photographs. Keep the photos to yourself and start your own personal album collection why don't you? No one wants to see your Syok Sendiri/"cam whore" pictures. It'll just become a laugh for people or in some cases, eye candy for the guys cos of your revealing short skirts and skanky tops. Have some self-respect people! You don't need to show your body to "make friends" or incite comments from people (be it good or bad), cos that's just plain pathetic and downright sad!
And if the photos that people post on facebook are family albums or a collection of photos from different events, why must they publicise it? I guess people these days don't like privacy, they have this urge to show ALL their facebook "friends" what their life is like and all the crazy shit they do. Hai... "mao lit". We are living in a narcissistic time--that's the only understanding i gather from all this.
If you say blogging is the same thing, i will surely agree. But the difference here is if it's public or personal. Mine's personal and no one will find it with a google search. And i know that only a handful of people actually visit my blog, these are my close personal friends and family members who i've given the link to. So thankfully I am not part of this "trend" or "facebook generation", and i will continually refuse to. I have this wish that a virus will kill sites like these, but it's only a wish, and these things hardly ever come true. HAHA...
I guess that's all i have to rant about for now. If you're a facebooker and you're enraged cos of what i've said, yay! That was the purpose of this. My anti-facebook outcry. You’re welcome to disagree. People have their own opinions about these things. And you’ve just heard mine.
That's all for now, thanks for reading and thanks for caring!
Anyway, life'll be busy soon... 3 3rd year films coming up... Was asked to be camera assistant/clapper on the first (titled My Son, My Boy-shooting from the 20th-24th of Sept); Gaffing assistant aka lighting assistant on the second one (titled In Self Defense-shooting from the 26th of Sept-1st of Oct); and second camera assist on the third (titled i don't know what yet-shooting from the 3rd-10th of Oct). I decided today to let go of 1 cos 3 consecutive shooting weeks will not be good for my studies or my health. haha... so i gave the second one to Reina, my japanese friend doing the same course in the same year as i am, we've been in the same production groups since first year first sem. Haha... And is so far my closest friend in the course. Have been trying to get her some contacts cos she's good at what she does, so i figured why not...
So... back to the main topic... facebook... facebook facebook facebook. Recent events have just begged for me to write about it.
I'm proud to say don't have bloody facebook. And I definitely don't have its counterparts, bloody friendster or bloody myspace either. I realise most of my friends and family probably do have one or the other or two out of three or all three... And i'm not writing this to offend anyone, what i'm about to say are just my thoughts on these sites, or rather "communities", as they've been referred to as such and why they completely piss me off. And to save my fingers more typing, i'll talk more specifically about facebook since it's the most popular these days. If you're a staunch facebooker, friendster fiend or myspace case, then you may not want to read on, it's entirely up to you.
Right, so much to say. Where should i start?
Should probably lay out why I can't stand facebook (3 main reasons):
-it's impersonal
-it's such an artificial way to keep in touch (despite what people say)
-it's contrived and therefore self-indulgent
the IMPERSONAL part
Anyone who knows me would know that i'm quite a private person, i usually prefer hanging out with one, two, three people at most... unless of course it's the utmost gang... or a group of my cousins... or girls from my senior 3 TTSS class when i'm back in KK, but other than that, i find that i'm more comfortable hanging out and talking crap with a smaller group as opposed to a big one. It's more private and personal and you can actually have REAL conversations... not just the surface how-are-you-how-have-you-been-just-trying-to-make-conversation stuff. So that's mainly what puts me off this type of "networking" sites. I refuse to believe that this is the best way to communicate. Whatever happened to phone calls? If you're overseas... Ok... why don't you try writing a letter? E-mail? Skype? MSN? These are far better ways of communicating that show how much you care and that you are making an effort and want to keep in touch.
Another reason why it's impersonal is cos your so-called "conversations" can be seen and read by anyone, if not the whole conversation, then at least half of what you said or what the other person said, depending on who you've "added as a friend" or worse, it can be read by any stranger if your "profile" is set to go public. I find it supremely stupid to put personal information like address, e-mail address, number etc on sites like these, especially if your "profile" is open to the public. This might be overly cautious, but don't deny that it can't happen--serial killers, stalkers... whoever... can harass you any time.
Again, my close friends would know how much i used to complain about friendster and how people just add anyone who asks... including people that they don't know... and some stories i've heard really make me laugh... like some 'fat hiao' girl having three different friendster accounts or something cos she keeps "adding" people that ask her to saying she's cute or sexy or pretty or whatever... How.... what's the word?... artificial!!!! And so what if you have a hundred friends, five hundred friends or a thousand. The real question is how many friends do you really have? I probably only have a handful of real friends (can count them with my fingers and toes; could be less, i don't know). The rest are just friends you meet once in awhile who have separate lives and are not in your "circle"; hi-bye friends or mere acquaintances. And i really don't see the point in "adding" these people in the first place, and i certainly don't make an effort to keep in touch with them, some are just fake, some are fun to hang out with once in awhile but not all the time, some you don't get along with all that well and tend to stay on superficial/surface-type topics everytime you meet, and others you just don't care about or don't like very much (mostly cos they're superficial).
Anyway, what's ridiculous about sites like facebook is that you add and add and add whoever the hell you meet that has facebook. At uni i always hear people asking other people after they've just met them and have talked for like 10 mins, "do you have facebook?" And everytime single time i hear this i roll my eyes... And everytime someone asks me i say "HELL NO!" or just NO if it's someone i don't know very well. Haha.
My friends who have facebook or friendster always tell me, "you don't have to add everyone, just your friends". And i always say, "yeah true, but no... still not doing it, i prefer a more personal way of staying in touch."
which leads me to...
the ARTIFICIAL WAY OF KEEPING IN TOUCH part
Lots of other people who have tried to push me to join facebook have said, "it's networking ma..." and again, i always say, "yes, but so what?"
If you're talking about film and tv networking, i've been told of a professional website that is only for people in the industry. I'd much rather join that. And if you're telling me other professions such as doctors, lawyers, engineers, architects etc have professional sites too, then great! Join those! If not, then well, there are other ways of "networking", there will always be someone you know who knows someone who knows someone else that can hook you up with a job or at least an interview. So why fret? Don't use the excuse of "networking" to justify bloody facebook/friendster/myspace. I'd rather people just tell me that they're "sam bat". Now, THAT i would believe. And dare i say that is the only thing that drives these sites and is the reason for their popularity--the busy-body, gossipy human nature. As far as I know and from what I have seen (my sisters, close friends, etc that have facebook, well especially my sisters) spend shitloads of time on facebook. What do they do on it? Update their own profile, upload pictures, look through other people's profiles, pictures, comments, write some comments on people's crap, join fan groups of shows, stars, whatever and give virtual gifts or do virtual stuff that really has no purpose if you think about it (how do i know? cos i see my sis doing it and sometimes i get called to see stuff on facebook about my sister's friends and whatever they're gossiping about). Another conversation i often hear of around uni is...
A: "do you know so and so?"
B: "no."
A: "you don't? oh, he's such a...."
or
"really? she's a..." (AND THE ENDS OF THESE SENTENCES ARE RARELY
SOMETHING NICE OR GOOD ABOUT THE PERSON, IT'S ALL
GOSSIP)
A: "he's/she's on my facebook, you should go check him/her out."
Anyway, my point here is that none of this stuff is personal no matter what you say or do on the site itself. And you often see artificial, again very surface-type conversations or worse things like flirting going on. Be aware people, anyone of your added so-called "friends" can read your private conversations (or called "walls") on freakin facebook, so what the hell is so private about it? MSN people! If you want to ask how someone is and want a straight personal answer, why don't you drop him/her a line? "hey, how are you?" would do just fine in my opinion. They're not online when you are? Fine! It's simple, an offline message would be nice too.
But i suppose there are people that want to be their connections and conversations to be known. Why? I really don't know and i don't see the point. But for these people, facebook is fan-freakin-tastic. Probably want to show how sociable they are or how many "friends" they have. Anyway, this leads me to my final point...
the CONTRIVED, SELF-INDUGENT part
All the information people put on facebook and is what they WANT other people to know about themselves, it's specifically filtered information for the "general public", it is......... contrived.
Why do people have to publicly announce their likes, dislikes, mottos, personality (i'm pretty sure there's such a thing to fill in). It's ridiculous. If you really want to get to know a person, get to know them! Don't read their bloody profile! All that's on it is what they want you to hear about them, it's what they claim they live by, it's what they think about themselves... it's all so bloody self-indulgent. Me... Me... Me... For all to see... I don't understand this culture, this mindset, this information overload, this dumbing down of communication. It really annoys me that people are so self-indulgent, just reminds me of those self-indulgent, up-themselves Hollywood directors. They're one in the same. Nowadays, everyone is so concerned with their "virtual" selves and "virtual" image and "virtual" social lives that they forget they have a life outside of facebook. There's plenty healthier more useful things to do.
I understand if you're 40 and not married and desperately want to find a "soulmate"... this display of personal information would go very well on a dating site. But this habit of "me on display" or "me on sale" has just become so pervasive on the internet now and all i can say is that people need to get a life or at least grow some feelings. What happened to truthful, heart-to-heart conversations and binding friendships? Is this what our generation has left? A site full of people you don't really know that continues to expand through interpersonal links that make relationships less personal?
Ugh... And don't even get me started on the display pictures/portraits/in some cases, headshots/studio photographs that people use for their "profile pic". And the tons and tons of albums of their personal photographs. Keep the photos to yourself and start your own personal album collection why don't you? No one wants to see your Syok Sendiri/"cam whore" pictures. It'll just become a laugh for people or in some cases, eye candy for the guys cos of your revealing short skirts and skanky tops. Have some self-respect people! You don't need to show your body to "make friends" or incite comments from people (be it good or bad), cos that's just plain pathetic and downright sad!
And if the photos that people post on facebook are family albums or a collection of photos from different events, why must they publicise it? I guess people these days don't like privacy, they have this urge to show ALL their facebook "friends" what their life is like and all the crazy shit they do. Hai... "mao lit". We are living in a narcissistic time--that's the only understanding i gather from all this.
If you say blogging is the same thing, i will surely agree. But the difference here is if it's public or personal. Mine's personal and no one will find it with a google search. And i know that only a handful of people actually visit my blog, these are my close personal friends and family members who i've given the link to. So thankfully I am not part of this "trend" or "facebook generation", and i will continually refuse to. I have this wish that a virus will kill sites like these, but it's only a wish, and these things hardly ever come true. HAHA...
I guess that's all i have to rant about for now. If you're a facebooker and you're enraged cos of what i've said, yay! That was the purpose of this. My anti-facebook outcry. You’re welcome to disagree. People have their own opinions about these things. And you’ve just heard mine.
That's all for now, thanks for reading and thanks for caring!
posted by My life in Brisbane, if you care... at 9/19/2008 02:23:00 AM
2 Comments:
Yeah I too know people who spend crap loads of time on facebook and I don't see the reason to do so.
I guess we're living in a era where the social trends of 'keeping in touch' are through these forms of communication.
Then again, everybody has their own ways of keeping in touch. I prefer calling and MSN.
Perhaps the majority prefer to follow the social norm like a herd of cows being led across a stream.
HAHA!!! i love your analogy! So true dude. Just felt like writing about it.
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