The other day, one of my friends came rushing to me and said, “You know that hot chick that was dating a loser? They just broke off. Now is my time to woo her and I shall do it before people even know about the break up”. I answered with a big grin, “Dude, we all know about it. It’s on her Facebook page. And in the last 24 hours, she has accepted 28 friend requests. You are very late.”
I wondered about life before Facebook. It was so nice and calm. Being nosy was an art. It required efforts to know about people’s ‘personal’ business. Something like interfering in other’s life and expect a ‘meddle’ for it. I have seen the pride when people gossiped about what they found out. To know about someone’s personal life, you either had to be inquisitive or had to be a very good friend. These days it is just with a click of the mouse. All we have to do is add that person on FB and there, we might even get his/her horoscope lying abandoned on the Wall. Seriously, there is more than enough drama happening on Facebook every day that it negates the need of having reality shows.
I used to wonder what it was like to read people’s minds but now that I too have a Facebook account I’m over it. It tells me about personal conversations between married couples. It talks about how much somebody loves his/her parents. It tells me all the places people have been to. What they have been drinking, eating, worshipping, ignoring or even playing. It has saved some from a terrifying ‘keeping-my-thoughts-to-myself’ addiction as well. It also provides visual aids. I don’t even have to go out of my house anymore to ogle at beautiful women. I do it all on my phone or laptop. I have started to worry about my physical stamina because I’m wondering when was the last time I ran to catch a bus just cause there was a hot chick in it. ;-)
And I am sure Mark Zuckerberg did not see it coming too. He made a social network to be circulated among the nerds of the university. Among people who lacked the conviction and capability to chat up with people or the time to visit an old friend. He did not realize that there is a nerd among all of us. There was a time when my interactions were required by other guys too. Now they rely on Facebook because they think it’s like the voices in my head are being put on a speakerphone.
And Mark you sure had no clue that with the advent of your website, we would be entering an age of too much information and that it would also act as a big morale booster for women and also be responsible for gender inequality. A morale booster for women, yes ofcourse Where else do you see a girl being so appreciated other than her FB picture. What they fail to understand is that there is a distribution pattern among those likes. 15% likes come from people who ‘Like’ everything. 35% likes come from female friends cause they hope that you would like her pic back.40% Likes come from Guys who would Like everything you put cause they feel with that they have a chance to woo you. Remaining 10% are the people who genuinely Love you and will Like everything you put. The rest from those women who feign the ‘Like’. ;-)
In short, to do everything that required people skills, can now be done through FB. This sure is not good news for me. I mean come-on if you do not have to do anything special to know stuff , it levels the playing field and I hate it.
Oh Facebook. I hate you so much. J
