When I joined Facebook in autumn 2006, it was just pioneering in the Czech Republic, but it was already obvious that it's spreading throughout the world like a "plague". I avoided it at first, because I'm not into everything that masses like and I also feared that my personal data could be abused. It was curiosity, friends from abroad and a spark of exclusivity that Facebook had at that time at least in my region that brought me there.
Come to the dark side
After I joined, I was really happy about all the fancy capabilities and I did my best to make my actual friends to sing up, so that I could start really using them. I became a Facebook advocate, fully aware of the "plague" I'm spreading, but it just seemed so beneficial for everyone. And so within a year, most of my friends did sing up, even the hardcore sceptics. They had no choice, when all the events and photos were on Facebook. They could choose - either to sign up or to be an outsider.
With my friends list reaching 100, it was becoming obvious that my "addiction" to reading newsfeeds about friends is not very sustainable. I had to start filtering and choosing to "see less information about these persons". I turned off the chat a short time after it was introduced. My growing friends list has another disadvantage - I'm loosing control of who can see what information about me.
I'm not adding anyone anymore and I almost stopped advocating Facebook - there are almost none of my actual friends left, who do not have accounts and there is no more need to advocate it, the movement is already there, the pressure on outsiders to join is already there, "the plague" is unavoidable. 250000 individuals sign up every day (link in Czech). I'm getting friends requests from people whom I actually don't want to have in my friends list, but I don't want to offend anyone, I want to "maintain good relationships" with them.
A service shaped for the served (or?)
The need of more control is growing and I know that I'm not the only one who has it. WHY DOES EVERYONE HAVE TO BE A FRIEND when they are actually not friends, they are just acquintances that I want to keep in contact with. WHY ARE THERE NO FRIEND GROUPS/LEVELS?
Facebook is not a mere internet service anymore, it has become a norm, it is changing the society in a HUGE way, that's what we can all agree upon. "I know you from Facebook" is becoming a common phrase. The concrete effects on society are yet to be studied, uncertainty is present. Even the EU commission realized that there is something happenig and warns that Facebook can be dangerous (link in Czech), because young people are sharing huge amounts of personal information without seeing the risks. How many times have YOU revised the information you share on your profile and your privacy settings?
Although it might sound like it, I'm not against Facebook now nor did I ceased to use it. Actually I use it more than I would like to... it's now my homepage. The question is, is it only the society that has to change, or should Facebook do a better job in fitting the society?!
If my post got you thinking and you want some more impulses for your ideas, see a very interesting related article "Alone among friends" from Sueddeutsche Zeitung analyzing Facebook psychologically and sociologically (in German).
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