So, to start out my New Year, Facebook, quite unsubtly I might add, broached the idea that perhaps I need to get out more, mingle more, or at the very least reach out and touch random strangers online. As I scrolled my News Feed, I came to the end – personally I didn’t realize there was an end to one’s News Feed – when lo and behold, an annoying helpful hint for bettering my life appeared.
“Add Friends to See More Stories.“ Now, apparently not content with just briefly assessing the situation and providing guidance, Facebook was determined to really drive the message home, so immediately following this statement, as in the very next sentence, was: “You’ll have more stories in your News Feed if you add more friends.”
Now I have about 300 friends on Facebook – some of those people are in the animal advocacy world like myself and some are in-the-flesh people I actually know or better yet, I’m related to. I think that’s plenty, thank you very much. Who the hell wants 1,000 friends they don’t know? Why on earth would I want to fill my friends’ list with people I don’t know or friends of friends of friends of that barista’s cousin (who made some damn fine coffee, but still…) who have no clue who I am or vice versa? Just so I can read more stories about Joe Blow’s wedding announcement fiasco, find out whose toddler just learned to open doors, or get pissed off at yet another stupid opinion on God knows what? No thanks.
Besides, Facebook doesn’t know…maybe I just have boring friends who have no stories to share. Did you ever think of that Facebook??
Musings from a Tangled Mind 
I’m finding FB more and more intrusive.
It really is — targeted ads are out of control, the algorithms they use to suggest friends is questionable (invasion of privacy), among other things.
Thank you for this. I almost joined FB again but am thwarted with your helpful post.
Also, if you add more friends and read more stories you’ll have less time to write blog posts!
I unwittingly reopened my (previously inactive) Facebook account because, in order to comment on a lot of WordPress sites, I have to use the Facebook logo in the corner in order for my comments to get through.
Since reopening the account I’ve been getting scores of daily e-mails from them each day which I now have to keep deleting constantly.
And (Get this now!): I never go on it except to read certain other people’s threads. But I never start a thread myself. I’m more into blogging and commenting on other folks’ blog sites.
Yeah, no. No Facebook for me. A company I once worked for required me to have an account so I could like their posts.
“But what if I don’t like your posts?” I asked.
“You have to like our posts to work here,” they said.
“But I don’t have to like working here,” I protested. “Why can’t I be silently miserable and downtrodden like most of the workforce? I can work here without actually liking it — right?”
I guess the idea is that someday you’ll get so many followers you’ll win the Internet … or something? I’ve been doing that on Twitter, but so far, I haven’t won anything yet. 😦