Sumiko Tan wrote an article on Sunday Times about Facebook, listing several reasons why she didn't see the hype about Facebook or why she won't ever sign up for it.
Somehow, it left a bad taste in my mouth after reading it.
The article, in my opinion, is very superficial, very negative, and seems to come from someone very caught up in her own world. Not many people are like how she says the pro-facebookers are. I don't love Facebook because it allows me to keep in touch with current friends and reconnect with old ones. I LIKE Facebook because of its functionalities, its unique applications, as well as the convenience of contacting a friend.
Yes. There WAS a hype. But when you are in the business for long enough, it becomes part of life. My friends and I don't go "OMG OMG OMG facebook rocks like hell and it's like soooo awesomely cool la!" Somehow, at least for me, I think it is something that is bound to happen. I am just embracing technology ... and technology is here to make our life easier. I guess my cliques just say stuff like, "Will upload these photos." And we all know where to get them from. =)
Most of us definitely know how complicated the word friendship means. We don't because we have 200 Facebook friends, then we have 200 real friends whom we can count on when we need to talk. We don't add friends on Facebook because we want to appear popular, or we are afraid of hurting that person by rejecting him. We add friends because, well ... they are REALLY friends, or you know how through some application games you need to ally up, or just for the simple plain fact "for fun".
Seriously, what's the big deal about facing up to the fact of adding a friend. It seems like to her, she's got to do her bit if she's calling you a friend. She's made it seems its a major huge task clicking the accept button ... and i don't like that. Life's too tough to think about these things. Just go with the flow man.
Her five reasons:
1) I have enough friends already, thanks. (What's wrong with networking? And ... are you married yet?)
2) I value my private space. (There's a privacy control settings ... and what makes you think people would want to know about you?)
3) I don't want to feed my voyeuristic instincts. (You are a voyeur and can't control yourself?)
4) The posturing one sometimes sees in Facebook makes me cringe. (You choose what you see. You choose to see posturing, whereas i am looking at entertainment.)
5) My time can be put to better use. (Oh definitely. Writing a superficial article on a topic that you haven't spent enough time on is definitely putting your time to better use. Sorry for the sarcasm.)
And you really don't have to waste any emotional energy angsting over anything on Facebook. Oh c'mon, it's JUST Facebook. Do you really have to put so much emotionalities into it?
It seems that you have plenty of skeletons in your closets ... if you mind so much about people seeing photos of you in any circumstances. We ALL have skeletons in our closets. We ALL have unglam shots. Too bad the digital camera got invented, and people has turned into a bunch of trigger-happy photographer. So what if you got caught puking or drunk?
Then when you go out with your close group of friends who all has Facebook and update photos regularly, do you opt out of photos in fear of having a vegetable caught in between your teeth?
Indeed, it may seem that there is a certain amount of posturing going on. BUT i don't think it's pretentious. If he depicts himself as successful, smart, happy, trendy, popular and well-travelled, he probably is. It's only pretentious when you think he isn't. And why can't he be successful when he listed himself working in a big company, smart when he listed himself as a graduate of some big university, happy when he's smiling in all his photos, popular when friends are all writing happy stuff on his wall and well-travelled because in his profile thought box, it says he is thinking of which country to visit next after travelling the whole of europe? =)
Scanning the article a second time, i can't help but notice the negativities peppered all over the page. "No harm was done ...", "a lot of ungenerous thoughts surfaced while i was checking out their albums", "Hmmm is that how her husband looks? Not quite the Prince Charming I'd imagined.", "Gosh, what an ugly jacket she's wearing.", "Why is he posting those ridiculous photos of himself?"
You have low self-esteem or what?
I think i have said enough.
Somehow, it left a bad taste in my mouth after reading it.
The article, in my opinion, is very superficial, very negative, and seems to come from someone very caught up in her own world. Not many people are like how she says the pro-facebookers are. I don't love Facebook because it allows me to keep in touch with current friends and reconnect with old ones. I LIKE Facebook because of its functionalities, its unique applications, as well as the convenience of contacting a friend.
Yes. There WAS a hype. But when you are in the business for long enough, it becomes part of life. My friends and I don't go "OMG OMG OMG facebook rocks like hell and it's like soooo awesomely cool la!" Somehow, at least for me, I think it is something that is bound to happen. I am just embracing technology ... and technology is here to make our life easier. I guess my cliques just say stuff like, "Will upload these photos." And we all know where to get them from. =)
Most of us definitely know how complicated the word friendship means. We don't because we have 200 Facebook friends, then we have 200 real friends whom we can count on when we need to talk. We don't add friends on Facebook because we want to appear popular, or we are afraid of hurting that person by rejecting him. We add friends because, well ... they are REALLY friends, or you know how through some application games you need to ally up, or just for the simple plain fact "for fun".
Seriously, what's the big deal about facing up to the fact of adding a friend. It seems like to her, she's got to do her bit if she's calling you a friend. She's made it seems its a major huge task clicking the accept button ... and i don't like that. Life's too tough to think about these things. Just go with the flow man.
Her five reasons:
1) I have enough friends already, thanks. (What's wrong with networking? And ... are you married yet?)
2) I value my private space. (There's a privacy control settings ... and what makes you think people would want to know about you?)
3) I don't want to feed my voyeuristic instincts. (You are a voyeur and can't control yourself?)
4) The posturing one sometimes sees in Facebook makes me cringe. (You choose what you see. You choose to see posturing, whereas i am looking at entertainment.)
5) My time can be put to better use. (Oh definitely. Writing a superficial article on a topic that you haven't spent enough time on is definitely putting your time to better use. Sorry for the sarcasm.)
And you really don't have to waste any emotional energy angsting over anything on Facebook. Oh c'mon, it's JUST Facebook. Do you really have to put so much emotionalities into it?
It seems that you have plenty of skeletons in your closets ... if you mind so much about people seeing photos of you in any circumstances. We ALL have skeletons in our closets. We ALL have unglam shots. Too bad the digital camera got invented, and people has turned into a bunch of trigger-happy photographer. So what if you got caught puking or drunk?
Then when you go out with your close group of friends who all has Facebook and update photos regularly, do you opt out of photos in fear of having a vegetable caught in between your teeth?
Indeed, it may seem that there is a certain amount of posturing going on. BUT i don't think it's pretentious. If he depicts himself as successful, smart, happy, trendy, popular and well-travelled, he probably is. It's only pretentious when you think he isn't. And why can't he be successful when he listed himself working in a big company, smart when he listed himself as a graduate of some big university, happy when he's smiling in all his photos, popular when friends are all writing happy stuff on his wall and well-travelled because in his profile thought box, it says he is thinking of which country to visit next after travelling the whole of europe? =)
Scanning the article a second time, i can't help but notice the negativities peppered all over the page. "No harm was done ...", "a lot of ungenerous thoughts surfaced while i was checking out their albums", "Hmmm is that how her husband looks? Not quite the Prince Charming I'd imagined.", "Gosh, what an ugly jacket she's wearing.", "Why is he posting those ridiculous photos of himself?"
You have low self-esteem or what?
I think i have said enough.
posted by LAH at
2:19:00 PM
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