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SOMETIME
last November, I got a little pissed at Flickr because I
could no longer organize my new batch of Boracay photos
into a set.
To those
still living in a world where they think Wordstar is the
best word-processing program ever invented, Flickr is a
digital photo-sharing web site where you can upload your
photos, organize them, put little captions, and
virtually store them all for free (well, almost). You
can choose to share the photos to anyone who’s sitting
in front of the computer and surfing web sites and such,
or just to a small private group of friends or family.
The
problem was, I couldn’t organize my new photos into
another set, like an album you see, on account of my
being a free-account user. Because I’m cheap and didn’t
want to spend $25 a year just so I could organize and
post an unlimited number of photos and sets, I searched
through the discussion forum to find solutions or
alternatives to the issue at hand.
Fortunately, some of the guys in the forum mentioned
Facebook, the social-networking site, which they said
allowed unlimited photo uploads. Hmmm...I thought that
sounded cool, although I was still wary of the
social-networking phenomenon that began with the
establishment of Friendster and MySpace.
I’ve
been invited a lot of times by Friendster users to join
the site but never did, because I couldn’t figure out
how you could call this person and that a “friend”
without actually meeting them in the physical world,
face-to-face. Some of the users had more than a thousand
“friends,” according to their pages. Then there were
those reports of kids committing suicide after bullied
on their MySpace pages. What ultimately put me off
joining these sites was this one guy whom I had never
met in person but e-mailed me nonstop to view his
Friendster profile, which I found creepy and annoying.
So my
joining Facebook was borne out of a real need—that of
wanting to have unlimited photo storage online—and
partly because I thought it would be a good social
experiment.
First of
all, I wanted to see how many of my real friends,
contacts and regular acquaintances would join the site.
I found out that among my e-mail contacts (Yahoo, Gmail,
Hotmail), there were a few who were already Facebook
members. So I restricted my invites to people I actually
knew, my friends, as well as a few acquaintances I was
interested in knowing more.
Two days
after I joined Facebook, 10 of my friends who were
scattered all over the world—the
Philippines,
Bangkok, Northern Marianas and the US—joined. Hmmm...not
bad.
Second,
as I plodded through my Facebook friends’ pages, I also
noticed that most of their friends were people they’ve
worked with, people they grew up with, or went to school
with, or even current companions and colleagues at work.
There were only very few who appeared to have “friends”
whom they met randomly online.
I don’t
know if it’s because I belong to a more—ahem—mature
generation (my youngest Facebook friend is 25, while the
oldest is probably in his mid-60s and an ex-priest) who
are more protective of their privacy, but only a couple
of my friends had about 130 Facebook “friends” on their
lists and I, too, knew most of those people, having met
them in press conferences or other social events. So
they were not strangers at all. So, generally, I think
Pinoys are still conservative when it comes to meeting
new people, especially online.
Since
signing up, I’ve had a couple of “friend requests” from
people I didn’t know and thus ignored, which is probably
contradictory behavior on what is supposed to be a
social-networking site. I’ve also ignored requests from
people I do know but don’t particularly care to
reestablish any relationships with, due to unfavorable
experiences with them in the past. I wouldn’t want to be
a hypocrite and pretend I like you now that I’m online,
right?
Third,
the great thing about Facebook and perhaps other
social-networking sites, is that I’ve been able to
reconnect with a number of people I have not seen nor
heard from in over 15 years who are now living in other
parts of the globe, just because I found them on other
people’s profile pages.
There’s
lovable Bessie with her still long curly hair, now
married and living in Shanghai with an absolutely
adorable son.
Then
there’s Tita Minnie, who used to be part of my barkada,
but whom I gradually lost touch with when she opted to
join the corporate world before going offshore. She now
works in
Argentina,
the lucky bitch.
Then
there’s Nona, who was two batches ahead of me in De La
Salle University but I knew her because we both worked
at the university paper. She’s now based in Sweden with
a grown-up daughter—and married. While we were never
particularly close back in college due to our differing
political beliefs (I was mostly a fencesitter), we now
constantly “feed” each other tiramisu or some other
yummy desserts.
It may
sound silly to those who aren’t members but on Facebook,
we send cybergifts of tequila shots to our friends, feed
and race one another’s pets, comment on recently
uploaded photos, bless and send good karma to one
another, and recently, I became a proud owner of a
“Tiffany necklace.” (One friend who isn’t a member
thinks that those who join such sites are just
“desperate” to meet men, the poor dear.)
Of
course, the site is now packed with a lot of annoying
ads (it’s the only way for the site’s owners to actually
earn from hosting the free service) and, technically,
you won’t know what gift you’ve received from another
person unless you send out an invite to at least 15
other people to use that particular gift application. So
it can be a tad irritating receiving numerous invites to
use an application. There’s also a lot of spam being
forwarded like chain mail, videos and silly photos.
Then, if
you’re like me who makes a living out of using the
computer and being online all the time, there is the
tendency to keep one’s Facebook page open for hours, and
use several applications at the same time. A friend of
mine in Boracay says she is hooked to the site, but
became embarrassed about being online all the time. She
finally had to disable her online status setting.
As of
today, I have 56 friends on my Facebook page, which is
probably small by average social-networking standards,
but if you know me, that’s actually more people than I
can handle in the real world on any given day anyway. I
like sharing my photos with my friends, and keeping in
touch, especially with those who are watching the sun
rise at the same time I’m off to bed. It’s also a smart
way of greeting your friends simultaneously on special
holidays like Christmas and Chinese New Year.
I don’t
think social-networking sites will ever replace meeting
people and making new friends the regular face-to-face
way. But I think these sites are powerful tools to keep
relationships going, and keep friendships alive and
current.
The only
downside in joining Facebook is that I found out that
creepy Friendster guy is also a member—and on a friend’s
page. Thank God for small mercies like “block this
profile.” All you gotta do is click, block and ignore. |
