Friday, August 28, 2009

How Facebook ruins friendships

This is an interesting article which explores the conundrum of social networking. For sure there has been a benefit from these tools and sites, for instance getting in touch with long lost friends from your past or getting fast status updates about an ill family member or friend, but what about the darker side? What about the envy, the narcissism, the TMI (too much information factor) or the emboldening braggadocio of others as they sit at a keyboard and not face to face with you? From what others are writing out there it seems that there is a bit of "Facebook Fatigue" beginning to surface.

One money quote from the article is this one. "Gwen Jewett, for her part, is sick of meal status updates. "A few of my friends like to post several times a day about what they are eating: 'I just ate a Frito pie.' 'I am enjoying a double hot-fudge sundae at home tonight.' 'Just ate a whole pizza with sausage, peppers and double cheese,'" says the 49-year-old career coach in suburban Dallas. "My question is this: If we didn't call each other on the phone every time we ate before, why do we need the alerts now?"

Indeed.

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