That darn Book!

The summer after my high school graduation, I tried to prepare myself for the college environment. All throughout high school, MySpace was the social site everyone used. It wasn’t until a friend of mine who had already been in college for a year had introduced me to Facebook, saying it was a more “Mature” social site. Summer of 2009, I made an account along with my close friends who were also going off to college in the fall. Being so used to the layout of MySpace we hate the fact that profiles couldn’t be personalized with songs or colorful backgrounds. Having very little friends the site became boring, so I rarely used it. It wasn’t until after my first semester in college my usage started to increase. Having the campus as our common ground, my friend list quickly spread in little in 3 months. From that point on I used Facebook to express feelings, share pictures and keep up with my high school peers who attended different schools then me. Socialization is the number one usage of Facebook. It allows you to connect with anyone around the world, no matter the time, place or date! Soon enough Facebook would add more features to the site keeping me addicted. Facebook sponsored games through Zunga (being the best edition) like as family feud, words with friends, and mafia wars. Being connected through Facebook, players were allowed you to play against your friends and collect coins for their winnings. The coins are then placed on their profile pages so everyone can see their ranking, competing being the reason more and more Facebook users took advantage to the gaming systems. The growing popularity of Facebook also put an increase in companies being represented on the site. A range of services from events to coupons can be accessed through a company Facebook page.

I started to shy away from Facebook when I realized the privacy settings weren’t as secure as I thought they would be. I had set my page to private since I first opened an account, but just like anything else on the internet; nothing is private! Public v Private on Facebook only pertains to users on the site. If you’re public any user and can view your profile, picture, friend listings and contact information. Private pages limit unlimited access by requiring the users to “approve friend request” in-order to access any information on their profile. You would think that this is 100% true off and on the site but indeed there are ways around privacy. Employers have the tools to access Facebook profiles public or private, and I’m sure anyone capable of accessing similar tools can do the same. It wasn’t until typing in my name in a search engine, capturing every picture had posted to Facebook; I had realized anyone could access my information. With this being said, it made sense for my COM 336 professor to instruct the class to make new Facebook accounts separate from personal pages. Decreasing exposure to your personal life is a sure way to eliminate judgment that can affect the workplace.

Throughout a year I learned the dos and don’ts of social sites. Over-usage (being the number one don’t) had become the number one rule to be broken. Too many updates would fill newsfeeds and annoy users. Spelling was also a pet-peeve of worldwide users. I can recall plenty of posts where “friends” would comment correcting grammar issues. This leads me to my next rule; internet experts. On every social site there is always that one user who feels they are an expert on any topic; don’t be that person! Do socialize with a friend, that’s what the site is for, and do take advantage of possible networking opportunities.

Facebook is an active site that is used today, but not through me. I’ve come into lots of situations where I felt like personal feelings have been altered over something on Facebook. It amazes me how many children use the site; what could an elementary or middle school child possible have to say on a social site. Especially in a stage where they are trying to find themselves they are so easily influenced with the nonsense they see on Facebook. I’ve seen porn, death and even drugs on Facebook; even in my maturity I feel like it’s inappropriate. Why is it a site intended for college students get shifted to students young as third grade? Money (advertising) is the obvious reason. My younger singings joining Facebook, has given me more than enough reason to deactivate mine. I see myself as a role model and as the same with employers; I will not allow my Facebook account restrict  that.