I miss the old Facebook

It's hard to believe that I've been on Facebook for over 4 years. I've seen it go through numerous makeovers and "enhancements". But I have to say that I'm longing for the old days, where Facebook was just between you and other college kids.

Granted under that definition I would no longer qualify to have a profile and I get that as people who had profiles graduated the site was going to have to be expanded so that those people could continue to enjoy the site. But opening it up to everyone and apparently everything has just made it kind of a joke.

First of all having prospective employers scan the site to check up on your hijinx. The thing that gets me about it though is that you can't always control what other people do or say or write on your wall. I've personally asked all my friends not to tag me in pictures. Not because I do anything that I'm embarrassed about but just because well I'm a person and yes I do like to have the occasional drink. But no future employer needs to see this. Especially since it may seem that I drink a lot more than I do if the only time I'm tagged in photos is when I've been drinking. It's none of their business and I certainly don't go around posting these pictures myself but I also don't think that I should have to worry about what my acquaintances decide to post. Yes, you can untag yourself from photos, but who wants to spend all their time fixing other people's mistakes? Now I'm pretty good about being appropriate. If you google my name you get about 3 entries about me. None of which are embarrassing or inappropriate. But I don't trust Facebook to be the same.

And then there is the issue of who to friend. I personally try not to friend anyone that I don't know in the flesh. I think I've got about 4 people who I don't actually physically know. Most of these are people who share my surname and because I'm all about history and knowing where you came from I didn't think it could hurt to add them for genealogical reasons. Who knows they might be a not so distant relative. But then you have my real relatives, you know the ones you only see on Christmas and special family occasions like weddings. Under old Facebook rules this would not even be a discussion since my cousins chose the pregnant and married route (and sometimes just the pregnant part). But they are technically family and I would feel bad if I had rejected their friend request. But really the more they post random status messages and choose to "like" different groups or phrases the more I want to just tear into them for being utterly ridiculous. And yet I hold my tongue for the aforementioned potential employer problem.

Which brings me to the next thing on my list of reasons Facebook is no longer the social networking site that I had grown to love. The stupid groups. Doesn't it just seem like there is a group for absolutely everything? I mean, really "I bet this steak can get more friends than PETA"? Really?!? This needs a group? Sure I've gone ahead and marked some things as "like". Starbucks for example, Moss from "The IT Crowd" (which if you work in an office and haven't watched I highly recommend), but I mean these are things that people are going to learn about me pretty quickly in regular conversation.

Okay I think that's enough of this for now. All I'm saying is that I miss old Facebook and there is a pretty good chance that I'll be disappearing from the Facebook scene in the very near future.

What are your thoughts on Facebook? Greatest invention ever or the potential downfall of civilization?

I'd rather not know

I've discovered something about myself recently. This story is going to sound totally pathetic and it kind of is but at the same time totally revealing about some things in my life.

On Thursday night I was supposed to meet someone for dinner. I don't want to exactly call her a friend. We used to be friendly but then we both got busy and sort of fell apart. This was supposed to be our second meeting since the Facebook reconnect. I hadn't been feeling well all week and came close to cancelling a few times but didn't. Anyway I showed up to the Olive Garden where we were supposed to meet and an hour and two drinks and two bowls of soup later she still hadn't.

So what's one to make of this situation? My first thought was "well she must have got stuck in traffic". That lasted for about 15 minutes. After half an hour I figured I must have gotten the day wrong, but I was almost certain I hadn't because I double checked before I left. After an hour I figured she must have had some kind of emergency and there would be a call or an e-mail waiting for me when I got home. It's 4 days later and still no call or e-mail. So I sent her a Facebook message and tried really hard not to sound too pissed off.

Here's the thing though, at this point I'd rather not know what happened. At least if I don't know there is a chance that it was an emergency and she didn't just forget about me. I'll feel pretty bad if it was that she just didn't remember that we had plans and went ahead and did her own thing.

I also realized that there are other things that I don't want to know. For example ,I still harbor my office crush. Even though I haven't been at work for nearly a year and therefore haven't seen him I have attached certain events to him. So when I think about those things I think of him. Anyway I've decided that I'd rather not know if he likes me, than find out that he doesn't. Or if I would get accepted to my choice of graduate schools, right now I have the hope that I would, if I apply and don't get in I'd be upset.

Is there anything you'd rather not know for certain?

reconnecting

I have several times wondered about the creepiness of the Internet. Sure the Internet is great for keeping in touch over long distances but at the same time people are able to find things about you and you may not even have existed. Take a second to check yourself in the Google search and you'll see what I mean. For example there is definitely a horrible picture of me from a tour that I did with and old job. I can't really get rid of it but it's certainly not something I would have posted myself.

It also comes up with some profiles of people I am connected to on Facebook. Which is also kind of scary. I realize that you should never post anything about yourself that you wouldn't be comfortable with a stranger knowing. I've generally stuck to that rule, but a the same time it's difficult to control what other people to in relation to your profile. I've threatened a couple of times to remove my facebook profile, more and more as people who were in elementary school when I graduated have joined.

But the Internet has also been a wonder tool for reconnecting with people I haven't talked to in forever. For example I had a good friend in high school who was a couple of years older than I was. She moved on and then I did and we've never reconnected until last week. To put the timeline in perspective I remember discussing how hot I thought Jensen Ackles was back when he used to be on Days of Our Lives. So I guess Facebook isn't entirely evil.

Crappy Facebook Applications

I'm one of those lucky people who doesn't have Facebook blocked at work. This means that I'm able to spend a good part of my day keeping up to date with all of the things that my friends are doing as well as taking advantage of some of the wonderful (and also some not so wonderful) Facebook Apps.

This is great unless those applications are down. For example I found this great application called "Knighthood". The great thing about in in connection to the ability to do work is that you can set your buildings to build/expand and it tells you exactly how long it will take. So you only need to go back to it for a few seconds to set the next one. So today one of the projects was finishing up while I was on coffee break so I figure great I'll set the next build when I get back. It's been down for 2 hours since so my building should be done and I could have been 2 hours into the next one but now I'm not.