I started using Facebook shortly after I entered graduate school in 2003. I was a Myspace user, but often lamented Myspace’s messiness. It was limited. Some of my college friends began to use Facebook and I saw it as a way to stay in touch with people. Facebook looked clean, but it was confusing why I could see everyone’s business: who they talked to, what they posted, what they said, etc… We have seen Facebook evolve from a “college only” website to a global network of all ages. Facebook is ubiquitous. My parents, who are retired, even have a Facebook page! Some bloggers have even commented how “uncool” Facebook has become since so many people are using it. (You are still cool Mom and Dad.)
Facebook has played with the concept of the “news feed” and the “live feed” for sometime. Currently, through the news feed you get the basic updates from people on pictures, posted links, and comments on your profile. The live feed does much more. It documents almost everything you and your friends are doing right now. You can always change what information you share in the Facebook security settings, but things get ridiculous. It can get annoying to see tiny details about your friend’s habits, especially if you have a large friend list.
In getting past the annoying nature of reading every minuet detail of your friends, we fall into the trap of Facebook live feed:
voyeurism. Traditionally, a voyeur is understood as someone who is watching someone secretly in some perverted way, but the voyeurism that Facebook offers is time waster that further pushes our society into learning every bit of gossip or information. We have become such voyeurs of information. We want to know every detail about celebrities, news stories, and popular culture stories. The “Balloon Boy” and his family in California was one of the most ridiculous news stories of the year. CNN, MSNBC, FOX News, and other media stations provided an over load on information and an unhealthy fascination on this story of attention seeking. It was such a non-story. It was sad to see parents use their children for fame, but let us not push that family deeper in to the spot light!
The voyeurism that Facebook pushes upon us is the need to know everything about everyone. I really do not need to know that a friend from college just joined the group “1 million people against the new Facebook.” The whole concept of Facebook is based on the idea that we really need to tell everyone what we are thinking. I know… I have done it too! I once wrote a status update that said: “I’m trying to come up with a pity status update, but I have nothing.” Or, “I’m eating soup.” No one needs to know that.
The voyeurism culture pushes us to watch reality shows where we see people ruin their lives as we laugh or high-five our friends in celebration of someone’s misery. We thrive on personal information, especially juicy information. In truth, the Facebook live feed is pretty much harmless. No one really shares anything that would ruin their life, but the live feed just shows us how culture is encouraging us to overload on information.
Sure, Facebook is meant to be fun. Most of it is meaningless fun. Facebook is a good way to keep up with family and friends with pictures, stories, and video. We just should understand that culture (with Twitter, Facebook, mobile apps, etc…) is telling us that we need to tell everyone our business. We don’t have to. Don’t fall into the trap of being a slave to the voyeurism of the Facebook live feed.
We are losing our filters of what people “need” to know and what people “want” to know. Now, after I just posted this blog, I need to think about what my Facebook status should be. “I’m sitting at the computer looking at the screen.” That should be something that everyone will enjoy.
57 Comments
I really don’t need to know what someone is eating, when someone is drinking or who just got out of the shower.
Same thoughts here as the author’s…
Facebook has evolved from a “social-networking site” to a “know it-all about your friends” site, it’s just so annoying to see even the tiniest details like (as you mentioned) “so and so joined this group” and the same thing a few hours later saying “so and so, so and so and even so and ‘x’ so others joined this group”, that just gets on my nerves!
Facebook is ok but DONT give out to much info about yourself
I really don’t need to know that you don’t need to know that. 😉
very interesting post, and i completely agree with your views! we really don’t need to know what our friends are doing/thinking/not doing at any given time on FB.
good post.
I think facebook is basically a stalker’s paradise.
(but it’s just so addicting!)
I completely agree. It’s a meaningless fun though I use Facebook as a means of knowing what’s the new happening (like their recent tour) with my old friends on my old school.
I think I’m one of those people who update the irrelevant updates. Most especially on twitter. Thanks for ringing the bell.
whatyoutakemefor: LOL… I should have mention the stalker’s paradise. The word “facebook stalker” is less intimidating than the real thing.
I concur! Facebook should be used simply for connecting and sharing with people. Yes, it absolutely drives me BANANAS when people update thier status with something ridiculous a million times through the day. It is similar to SPAM and those people I either ignore or delete! “)
Use facebook positively! People clearly have WAY too much time on their hands. Think of how productive 1/2 of these people could be if they weren’t consumed with FB. Limit yourself people!
🙂 M
Good post! I agree. I don’t care, or need to know that you are on your way to/home from work, what you are cooking, drinking or eating, etc. Most of the status updates are just a waste of time.
Great post. btw, can I be your friend on fb? I’d like to keep up on what you’re doing. 😉
Good Article. It’s almost as if the Voyeurism that you mention is caused by a “reverse voyeurism.” The idea that people want everyone to know what they are doing.
As you said, no one cares if you are eating soup, but some people are in the mind set that they think people want to know this! And they want people to want to know this!
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Well put. Sharing the mundane details of our lives is completely unnecessary. And I like the way you linked FB to the broader trend of oversharing and voyeurism in our society. In fact, you could run this post together with your last one on Jon Gosselin, since balloon boy, Jon and Kate, and Octomom are all part of the same broader trend.
i resisted fb for some time, then gave in, ..and now i’m sucked in. i don’t have a mobile crackberry nor an iPhone, yet I find myself when i’m at the store thinking of something that i should be posting RIGHT NOW.
good post!
What you are saying is so very true but I’m a FB addict and I can’t seem to help myself. I log on to it from my phone all day long. Love it! Violette L. Reid, author of The First Chronicle of Zayashariya: Out of Night and Violette Ardor: A Volume of Poetry.
great post, totally agree with you. I am on facebook and Twitter and feel to quit both rather soon! It takes up too much of my time, when I could be doing other things! Arghhh.
I disagree with the author.
First of all, it is everybodys choice to write what the are doing right now. Of course no one really needs to know that i’m eating a sandwich right now, and so i never post something like this on facebook. Some poeple do, but i really don’t care.
Most poeple, at least my friends do, post their current thoughts like “omg, i should learn for my math exam, but instead i check on FB”, or post links to other websites and youtube videos. Those are things i also write my friends occasionally via icq.
An besides: reality shows existed loooong before facebook and other social networks, that problem didn’t evolve from the internet, but the need for some poeple to watch other poeple has always been there!
I don’t touch facebook with a barge pole. Lethal. It’s hard enough keeping track of the people I see in real life and keeping them in or often more appropriately out of the loop.
Give me a break, do you feel the need to listen to every conversation when you are standing in line at the grocery store? This is nothing new, you have your own filter, use it. If the comment is trivial skip past it, if a person does nothing but make noise put them on ignore or unfriend them.
Facebook does not replace human contact but it gives us the ability to keep up with friends and family all over the world in just a few minutes a day. I call that a time saver, if I had to call every one of my FB friends for an update once a month I would have to cut some of them out of my life for lack of time.
As far as the gossip aspect, we are able to choose what we publish and people hear it from us – that’s the opposite of gossip.
Facebook is not the problem; it may expose self control and obsession issues in certain people but those issues were already there.
Thanks for your comments everyone! Keep em’ coming.
i got on fb and ms because family members said if i wanted to see more photos of them that is where they posted them easily. i go on fb regularly and submit info that i think is useful to share and photos too. i regularly delete as well. i am in my 50s and i think those of us who are older seem to find it easier than emailing updates to family, it is the younger friends and fam who write the “i’m tired!” comments. and i am absolutely certain that my nephews are very irritated when i comment on such posts.
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love the post!!! I recently got rid of my facebook account for the second time. I not only find it annoying to see who’s doing what etc but it’s become some sort of social networking blackhole. I often feel it’s hard to get out of it – yet you’re pulled back in. I think it’s safe to say that I won’t be getting back onto facebook anytime soon.
I also find, that yea sure it may be some sort of useful tool to “keep in touch” with those we’ve lost touch with, but I find that it’s just an excuse to keep tabs and be, well, nosey.
I even find tho, that you’ll find a friend on there from way back, msg each other back and forth and then it one day, stops. It’s like people just add you or msg you just because they want more friends and feel they can say, “oh I just caught up with so and so, guess what they’re up too” facebook for me, went from being fun to one major pain in the ass.
thats my two cents.
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If you don’t want others to know what you’re up to, don’t update about your lives. You can even add a privacy setting that don’t let certain individuals see your updates.
If you don’t want to see other people’s “annoying” updates, there’s always the option of un-friending that annoying person.
Sure, the live feed is annoying, but there are a lot of other options and complaining about it in your status, for example, only screams “I WANT ATTENTION”
I liked the old update feed. This new one just overloads things. I find myself have 300+ updates everyday to look over. Of course I should start taking advantage of that filter system.
About the voyeurism problem, I’ve experienced it. There was this one young woman who I met briefly in college but all she did was reply to every new status I posted. It got to be very annoying and stalker like. So, I finally just blocked her from seeing my status.
Good post. Of course, twitter is even worse in terms of having to know every second of what someone is doing. The whole social networking thing is a catch-22. Some of my friends use it in some pretty cool ways. Others are sending status reports on facebook about how their left breast is sore from breastfeeding. (No joke. That really happened.) Talk about TOO much information. 😉
This was a thoughtful piece; thanks. It is really pretty easy to go into one’s fb settings and make it so that everyone does not have to see the minutiae of one’s social networking life, but I think many people don’t know how to do that, or don’t care enough to do it.I have already hid “Farmville” and “Mafia Wars,” and, although I can usually just scroll past useless information, I have hidden a couple of folks who post about every breath they take, or complain constantly.
I guess most people are addicted to ‘recognition’, virtually or not. Nowadays (and especially with the short attention span issue) you’ll no longer have (or go for) 15 minutes of fame – but a chance to have several 15 seconds of fame. Until you quit and join another social network, of course.
On the other hand, it’s rather interesting that a minority actually seems to know how to use a social network, and occasionally share some knowledge (even if it’s how to hypnotize a chicken – hey, you can’t please your 1,257 ‘friends’). But that’s more the news feed, not really the ‘vicious’ live feed.
Some people do “over-post” things such as “eating Nutella right now!”, which might be considered on this arm of the Galaxy as quite boring and useless. But then again, social networks are also a marketing tool – it’s also the “you brand”. Family, co-workers, friends, pets (never saw pets, but hey, they found water on the Moon) – they’re all different groups of people but they all have a unique personal image of You…
…so if you do have to spam (sigh), why not be creative? I’d find it much more interesting (for a span of 10 seconds, of course) if you wrote something like “Thinking, breathing, BATHING IN NUTELLA!”. Well it’s all very subjective, really – but if you really want to share with the World that you enjoy Nutella, a different way to put it might provoke some giggles at least.
And finally, there are also those who register to play “Family Farm”. I delete them because – quite personally – there’s nothing more annoying than your friends finding lost virtual sheep.
Don’t Panic.
I fully agree! As human beings we were meant to be productive, creative! Lets do something good instead of stalking and wasting our precious TIME!
I couldn’t agree more…I log onto Facebook every once in a while only to find a massive amount of information from people I barely even connect with anymore. To be honest, I don’t mind reading my friends’ status updates or seeing their pictures – it’s kind of nice to hear about their outlook on life now that we’re all at different colleges for the first time. But I don’t need to see everyone that my friends are becoming friends with – I mean, in most cases I don’t even know half of the people!
And THANK YOU, guitarra, for echoing my Farmville complaint (at least, I think that’s what you are referring to?). Considering that at least half of my friends play it, I am greeted every single day by countless variations of Farmville notifications. “Sarah has just become a level 22 farmer! Bob needs your help fertilizing his crops!”
I love the social aspect, but sometimes I’m simply overwhelmed by it.
Great post! I agree and that’s why 1 month ago I decided to cancel my account. I think that facebook has become a great place for disturbed people.. If I want to know how’s going with friends I just call them, or use the old and sane communication tools, like messenger or skype. The only things I’ll miss about facebook are the games, like word/brain/music challenge.. Lol
I agree with jan and guitarra pirata!.
It`s about sharing interesting thoughts and information. Those are the ones I interact with on FB and FB has been really good for (re)connecting with those people, whom I feel I communicate well with.
I just let the uninteresting updates flow by, they are not so many. Those who have nothing useful to share don`t always say so much either, they only comment on other people`s updates. But I did filter away a few annoying persons who share long texts about trivial stuff.
Your post holds much truth. I have actually left the world of Facebook for many of the reasons you covered.
ha i just spent twenty minutes on facebook and two minutes here. i think i only enjoyed two out of the past twenty two minutes of my life.
I joined Facebook earlier this year and find it truly boring. Accounts of people’s every move in “Farmtown”, plays in Vegas Slots, friends catch up with you but don’t keep up with you, ughh. I want real thoughts and ideas, that’s why I prefer blogs. North Coast Muse @ http://sally1029.wordpress.com
I found FB was interesting as a way of sharpening my observational skills (my one liner has gotten much better these days:). More than once I found hidden qualities of some people who are normally too shy to talk about themselves. But sadly I gradually feel that by giving more and more information about each other, people seem to become also more and more indifferent about each other… FB fatigue?
Well said. Thanks for a great read.
Sadly, I feel that by giving out more and more information about ourselves, people seem to become more and more indifferent about each other.
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Excellent post.
It’s very true that facebook is turning into an extravaganza of free information on demand from all that you know. I think it’s really taking the hardwork and fun out of forming relationships. It’s not uncommon to start telling someone what you have done, but get interupted by a “yes, I read about that already.” It’s almost as if you have to start not mentioning things in order to have something interesting to say.
Mattou
DieganSquared.com
What about when you discover that someone you like and respect has joined a group such as “white power forever” or “ban abortion now”. Facebook can literally destroy relationships, even friendships.
[…] issues, the new live feature is making people quite angry. Here is a blog post that I read about The Pitfalls of Facebook “Live Feed”. But, something that I was interested in, and a little let down by were the other versions of […]
I definitely see facebook moving to become more and more like twitter which is annoying because I have facebook for a reason.
FB is not making this overly self-indulgent world better nor worse.
love your writing style. i completely agree- we shouldn’t fall into the trap of telling everybody everything! but it’s true, it’s meaningless, harmless fun. well “harmless” is debatable b/c it really is a stalker net.
Some bloggers have even commented how “uncool” Facebook has become since so many people are using it.
Going by their logic and line of thinking, MySpace is getting “so-cool” by the day. If that hint isn’t strong enough, how about this – Peeople want to do and experience things at Facebook. It’s a tool, so if they are so keen on getting away from the uncool masses, why not start something at Ning? Here’s an idea – Name it “Facebook II – Cool Bloggers”.
As a mum of teenagers, one of whom is a student living away from home I love that they post everything the do, think or feel on facebook as I know where they are, who they are with and what they are doing at any given time – from a parents perspective its great! However it leaves little to talk about when I see them or when talking to my father who is also on facebook so I think we are in danger of loosing the art of conversation and its only a matter of time before we all sit in the same room in complete silence blogging/emailing and texting each other!
Facebook ! . Not the safest of sites once you have ended a relationship , fallen out with someone etc.
Messages still arrive via other “friends” due to connections plus profiles and info can still be available such as locations,and new friends through their profile .
Absolute worse , contact your network and tell them to block this person ? .
Better still , find a new site !
That was an excellent blog post, how you shed light on the ‘live feed’. That was a big reason that I de-activated my account – from being an online network of keeping contact with friends, it became some sort of virtual-reality world. One can share all sorts of information, 24/7 and in real time, but not meet or exchange even an actual voice conversation in person, for days on end. And really, not much thanks to live-feed for that! Personally, the live feed tired me out, and put me off. I would come home from work and log on to see notices about my friends who had stubbed their toes on furniture, or just ate the best sandwich in the world. It was a barrage of information.
That said, this particular drawback for me, is a perk for many others i.e real-time and high-speed connection to friends online – The discerning user will know how to work this to their best. Promotion of business, music for example.
Bookmarks Online – Free service for netizen where they can keep their bookmarks Online.
love your writing style. i completely agree- we shouldn’t fall into the trap of telling everybody everything! but it’s true, it’s meaningless, harmless fun. well “harmless” is debatable b/c it really is a stalker net.
You could easily be revealing more than you would normally do in the real world.
–Liz
I definitely agree with people telling us updates on the most senseless things. The eating the soup thing was truly funny! I recall before the advent of social networks when we used the actual telephone when it was attached on the wall in the home to talk to friends and let them know what we were doing *gasp*! I remember a friend saying, “Yeahhh I’m having hot dogs and fries for dinner.” I just stood there thinking okay…and you’re telling me this because…I never knew some odd years later that finding out what people are doing throughout the day would be a craze. We have moved beyond the whole “how are you?” to “what are you doing?” Just plain creepy, great article!
I agree, yes, yes. I don’t really need to know everything about their lives. And if I have to, none with the eating soup stuff. I’d rather know who’s dating who. I mean, juicy gossip, although not really something I enjoy everyday, is better than knowing if you are eating soup or whatnot.
nice post. thanks.
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