Happy Valentine’s Day!
In late January, I proposed a Facebook meme to share a love song a day for February that contains Valentine’s Day.
The first seven songs I had shared can be found through this link.
Below is the second set of seven great love songs of my list and some short commentary with each.
In late January, I proposed a Facebook meme to share a love song a day for February that contains Valentine’s Day. Here are the first seven songs of my list and some short commentary with each.
Why, for love, of course!
But if that’s not a good enough reason, here are a few more reasons with real emotional, intellectual, social and psychological benefits, to you and all who can look at your Facebook Wall, unlike most other memes.
I’ve recently written some posts on purging your Facebook friends list due to the misuse, abuse and harm of Facebook friendships incurred by many people (links below). The issue has recently gotten more attention via talk show host Jimmy Kimmel calling for Wednesday, November 17, to be National Unfriend Day of NUD, and I am here to help with some tips and challenges should you want to take part in National Unfriend Day. This also goes for MySpace, LiveJournal, Bebo and other social networking platforms where you can add friends, but the main focus is on the largest social networking platform in the world, which is Facebook.
Vodpod videos no longer available.
Because Facebook friends can be spies, now or in the future when someone decides to no longer like you, especially people you don’t know well but have as Facebook friends. With Facebook’s new Friendship Page feature that gives everyone creepy new spying capabilities on other people’s profiles, the fact that Facebook friends can be spies has never been truer. Facebook friends have access to everything you have unless you block them from specific things. But let’s be serious. How many people really do that? And even if you did, isn’t that enough of a creep factor to get you to unfriend them? And why are you causing yourself stress in watching your back on Facebook all the time since you might have to block certain friends from potentially every new thing you post?
Jimmy Kimmel talks about unfriending because Facebook has cheapened the meaning of friendship. I have also written similarly about the meaning of friendship versus Facebook friendship. However, there is a real life threat to Facebook friendship and not just an ideology here.
If you missed National Unfriend Day, there’s no reason NUD couldn’t be any other day during the year for you. In fact, I would recommend you purge your Facebook friends list several times during the year.
It seems to me we’ve had enough bad stories of people getting caught on Facebook for everything from cheating to hate statements to inappropriate work comment and other such bad behaviours, but not many people still care all that much. Just remember, those behaviours aren’t what got those people in trouble. It’s the fact they had Facebook friends who saw the behaviours and did something about it, even if unintentional like sharing it in some way, online or in real life.
This could be tough for some people to do so I have a set of questions you can ask yourself of each Facebook friend you might consider removing. These are for the less obvious choices, but can be for any one on your Facebook friends list.
Hardly. People seem to think that those with tons of meaningless Facebook friends are the ones who are insecure. Knowing who your friends are, and who are not, is a sign of personal security and integrity, not being mean.
If you have common friends with someone you untag, they may notice having been removed if you post something on your mutual friend’s wall and they see it by looking or a notification of others posting on the same post. They’ll probably only realize it because they see your name and realize they hadn’t seen any updates from you in a while. So what if they add you again? Awkward?
Maybe. But you can avoid it by blocking them after you remove them. Or ignore the friendship request. If it means that much to them, and if you have any real friendship in life, they can talk to you about it. If you have any real friendship in life, this Facebook friend stuff shouldn’t matter. Really, it’s not the end of the world.
Try my Remove 5 Facebook Friends challenge. This was posted on September 30, by the way, 5 weeks before Jimmy Kimmel asked for National Unfriend Day. 🙂
For those who like to flaunt their life fun on Facebook, especially if there’s a little element of risk to it, how’s about flaunting your Facebook unfriending Facebook tagging style?
Facebook friends dumped tagging meme
I highly recommend you do this after you unfriend the people you tag, of course. Now, you can’t tag a picture with a link to someone you aren’t Facebook friends with, but you can always type in their names instead of choosing from a box listing your Facebook friends. This is like if you were to tag a photo of the Loch Ness monster, Darth Vader, Wolverine, Harry Potter, Bella Swan or anything else. They don’t have Facebook profiles, so far as I know, but you can still tag them in pictures. Same idea for Facebook friends you’ve dumped.
I don’t know how much media clout, or pull, Jimmy Kimmel will have in proposing National Unfriend Day, but it’s good advice. Even if it doesn’t do well, it’s the first year. Things take time to adapt, and more time if it’s a once a year occurrence. But remember what I said above…
If you missed National Unfriend Day, there’s no reason NUD couldn’t be any other day during the year for you. In fact, I would recommend you purge your Facebook friends list several times during the year.
Remember this fun Facebook in Real Life video? It needs a seriously creepy update!
Nov 6 2010 update:
This article just became much more relevant after Facebook introduced the Facebook Friendship Page feature on Oct 29, 2010.
Many, if not most, Facebook users have more friends on their Facebook Friends list than are good for them. Having more Facebook Friends means more people are watching you. There more people to waste your time, even if just having to sift through their updates to find ones from people you care about. There are also more people who could use something on your profile against you in some way, even if it’s just gossip, possibly from misunderstandings or unintentionally. We’re not even talking about potential creeps and malicious people here, who you don’t know well but had casually added as Facebook friends over time.
On a different topic, there are all kinds of Facebook memes, or trends, going on all the time. Facebook tagging is big. Facebook notes get passed along. There was that 25 Things You Didn’t Know About Me thing that only helped making your ID easier to steal. Then there were the baby photos or retro photos trend that also helped in the case.
So how’s about putting the two together for something useful?
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A challenge to remove 5 Facebook Friends and pass it on!
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These would be “friends” in the loosest sense of the word, of course, not any real friends. I don’t think most people need any help to do this challenge if they want to take it up. That’s how frivolous I think the Facebook Friends thing has become for most Facebook users. However, if you need help or want to do a more serious purging, check out some of my criteria for identifying Facebook Friends you can remove without a lot of consequences.
I took up my own challenge, of course, and went way over 5.
Can you?
If you don’t take the challenge, maybe just ask yourself, can I remove 5 Facebook Friends from my list? It’ll give you an idea of the state of your Facebook Friends list to where it maybe should be.
If you can remove 5 Facebook Friends from that thought experiment, maybe you ought to reconsider, especially now that you know you can. It’s just some clicking and scrolling now. 🙂
Or try it Facebook tagging style! (obviously you can’t tag these friends’ profiles, but you can tag and type in their names)
Facebook friends dumped tagging meme
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Which Facebook Friends Should I Remove?
“Study” on Facebook Narcissism and Insecurity not REAL Research
A Few Thoughts on Facebook Friends (and some polls)
How to Cancel or Retract Friend Requests on Facebook… and Why?
The Prejudices and Privacy Perils of Facebook Quizzes
How to Get Rid of Your Facebook Past
25 Things For Facebook You Can’t Steal My ID With
25 Things You Gave on Facebook to Help Get Your ID Stolen
Una Guía de Netiqueta Práctica para Facebook
A Practical Facebook Etiquette (Netiquette) Guide
Flesch-Kincaid Grade Reading Level: 7.1
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