Face book

Facebook has become one of the leading (if not THE leading) social network world wide. Most people began Facebook for no other reason than, “everyone else did...” I personally had specific reasons for joining it, and after looking at those I want to record what I view as the pros and cons of Facebook itself.

When most of my friends disappeared off to college and failed to write back emails, return phone calls, or reply to texts I decided to get on face book to keep in touch. As I discovered when I joined, those friends rarely communicate with me via Facebook and the principle reason being they developed new friendships at their colleges.

Finding this out I contemplated deactivating my face book, but I found that Facebook offered opportunity to keep up with some of my high school friends who (as I became busy with dual credit college) had became slightly distant. Using Facebook has given the the opportunity to keep up with them. While my original purpose wasn't held intact I did find a legitimate purpose for having it.

Friends in debate attempted to create what was effectively a 'Home school face book' which although it was started with the best of intentions didn't get much momentum that lasted. Like most participants I staid active for almost a month before I dropped off the face of the program, which now is ending because of lack of funding. This attempted “Home school Facebook” known as JibeNow illustrates some of the good points of Facebook.

The principle good in Facebook is the sense of community it provides for it's participants. My good friends the Sears moved to Michigan and I'd started to loose contact with them. Through Facebook I sustained a running friendship with both Tim and Steve (my two bro's through all but blood) and now Tim and I are both joining the U.S. Army and planning on attending college together.

No one can dispute the fact that Facebook does provide a real backbone to friendships and relationships, but the meat of everything, as always, is up to the people. It allows people to be able to share their experiences and what is currently going on with them with those who aren't intimately involved so that all of their friends can keep up with one another.

Although the capability for good is great, the bad or negatives are just as present. First and foremost is the time drain it presents for it's participants. I know many people who spend their days observing and involving themselves with other people's lives without doing meaningful things with their own lives. Not dissimilar to how blogs can become monsters that devour people's lives into spending every moment so they can record it, letting everyone know about whats going on with you prevents people from actually doing anything to let people know about.

High school and college polls are recording the time spent by an average Facebook user in amounts of days, not hours in a given week. What this means is that for many Facebook users, they can spend in excess of 48 hours spread over the 168 hour week. This means averaging about 6 hours of passive (not necessarily constant) involvement on face book a day.

Weighing the pros and cons I think I will probably keep my Facebook until I start a family. The only purpose it serves now is to full a social need most humans have that I don't get even attending college part time. Once my face-to-face social life gets more time, Facebook is going out with the rest of the unnecessary elements of a child's life...