You and your Face-book

This will hold many elements of throwing rocks in stone houses, so perhaps I should explain so I can be misunderstood correctly. I use Facebook. Often. Daily. This will also be my perfect argument for being right, as I refuse to be one of those criticising a product without actually using it. I'm also fully aware that Facebook has been discussed enough for a hobbit's foothair to get bored of the subject.

It's the stupidity involving Facebook that I hold closest to heart. Articles such as this . There are thousands of them, I just picked one at random. People being fired because of what they've said about their employer on Facebook. Really. This is so easy to avoid. Either don't add your boss as a friend, or make sure your privacy settings don't allow people you aren't friends with can see your wall. Seriously, how difficult can that possibly be? It's not really Facebook's fault that you a) hate your job, b) are an idiot. The tools to avoid this scenario are there.

Then there's another matter, one that doesn't only apply to Facebook, but all Internet activity; the one about embarrassing pictures of you. You know the kind, you're drunk, you're seminaked, you're doing something illegal. They will haunt you forever they say. Sure, might be so. Two things, are you really that important to the human race that anyone cares about your behind or your nipples and what are you doing putting such images in a forum where they can be found by anyone? If you feel you must have your privates or drunkeness displayed online, why not do it under a fake name so that they can't be located by a simple visit to Google? It's not rocket science. Keep what you want to have private away from places where they'll no longer be private. Relating it to Facebook again, as that is what I said I would mainly dedicate this post to, check your privacy settings once more. I'm also aware of the complication of others posting images of you. You can't really control that as much, other that to try to behave yourself by cameras.

Continuing down the route of images. I'll try to keep it brief, the Internet has made our attentionspans oh so short, after all. Do we really need pictures of every second of our lives? Two things, are you really so important that people look at all those pictures of you, your clothes, your flower arrangement, your drive way, your dirty floors, your newly dyed hair, you puking in the bushes after that awesome party and how much of actually living did you miss while taking pictures and posing? All rhetorical questions, my answers are all implied. There's sharing, and there's sharing too much. We should be more selective when it comes to what we let others see. Whatever happened to showing pictures only to those who care about what they're of? You know, dog pictures to people who like dogs, prom pictures to those who went to the prom, or possibly your grandmother, and so on.

Most of us have hundreds of friends on Facebook (well, I don't have hundreds, but that's because I'm not cool), but how many of these are actually our friends? I can look at my wall and come to the conclusion that my actual friendships aren't very well represented there. One of my best friends doesn't even have an account. Jeez, she can't be a true friend then, she didn't comment on my latest status. Then I also have friends who I only communicate with on Facebook. I don't call them, I don't see them, I know nothing about them. Shallow acquaintances. That doesn't mean they don't occasionally make me laugh or make me grind my teeth. It'd be better if Facebook distinguished, or simply didn't call it friends, but something like "contacts" instead. Hopefully my real friends know I appreciate them even if I don't post on their walls on a daily basis.

Endless detailing in status updates. Again the question is if you're important enough for anyone to care. All I can think of is that you're making yourself vulnerable for stalkers if you are in fact that important. They'd know when you left your house to go to the store, which shelf you're currently standing at and when you'll be home alone. Another category of status updates that walk on my last nerve are the passive aggressive ones, you know the kind "Nobody likes me, nobody cares, I'm so bored, I hate you - you know who you are". Same with superperky or religious ones. Of course I'm aware of that thing we call freedom of speech, so you're free to post whatever you like. I'll exercise my own right to do as I please and I'll hide you from my feed and write a slightly passive aggressive blogpost about it. It's all rather ironic, and irony amuses me. Unlike the latest news about your offspring's cold, your own stomach flu, your going to church or latest purchase. What's with all the negativity, anyway? Oh, I know, I know, this post is rather negative, but like I said, irony amuses me.

With sites like Facebook we can all be rockstars. Display ourselves as we want to be, decide which side is the most flattering and only show that. We can be interesting, entertaining and social. We can share so much of ourselves that the search results after googling match those of a celebrity. Not really, but maybe if you compare the result to what it would have been in 1995. There's so much information, so many pictures that we're drowning in a stream of them. Once more I ask, are you really that important? Oh, I should probably add that Facebook has a setting you can adjust, whether or not to allow third parties, such as search engines to be able to access things you have posted, including your name.

As with everything else there are two ways of looking at it, you can either make your Facebook about you, or your friends. If you like having all that information about yourself out there, by all means share, if it's about your friends, take a moment to think about what they'd like to see before you share. They do go hand in hand, I'm aware of that. Maybe I'm being cynical again, but I honestly don't think pictures of myself or details about my every day life are that interesting, and those I'm important to already know anyway. No need to waste server space on that.

To put it in plain English, as plain as it can be from someone with Swedish as a first language, I have posted too many pictures of my cats, too many pictures  of my driveway - yes, one is one too many, I have made noninteresting status updates, but I have never posted anything with the intention to hurt anyone's feelings, to brag (I might not be cool, but I'm incredible), and I'd like to think I've never posted anything remotely related to self pity, even when I pity myself the most. So, how many of these things am I guilty of? A few, quite a few actually. How do you think I know it's all stupid?

I have many suggestions as to how to improve Facebook, ones who would make it more user friendly, and in that lessen the critique, so if a representative of Facebook would like to contact me and offer me oodles of money for my ideas, don't hesitate to do so.

A cover

Truth be told

The other night I watched a TV show about body language. Towards the end of it a woman demonstrated her company's new software, one which detects lies in the voice. She said something down the lines of that "now you can tell if someone isn't being truthful, their voice will always give them away."

Question is, do we always want to be told the truth or are there times where lies are necessary and the preferred option? The mere fact that I'm asking that question should imply the answer. We need lies, they're social lubrication. We simply wouldn't function without lies. Naturally it'd be slightly mean to tell big lies and deceive but the same goes for telling the truth too much. It can be quite hurtful on an unnecessary level.

The classic example is being asked "how are you?", we know better than to always be truthful, and reply with the nonanswer of "fine, thanks". There is a time and place to tell the truth, and lies fill the void. Now if everyone walked around with a computer equipped with that software and it constantly told us when someone's lying we'd waste so much time. I know I would refuse to speak at all. I don't want anyone to know everything about me, and everytime that screen'd say "plausible lie" a doubt would begin to grow. Not so much about what the truth actually is, but why I lied.

Always expecting others to tell the truth is also mighty selfish. What right do you have to pry? If something's kept from you it's for a reason. Is it really desirable to draw something out that's obviously not intended for you? It has to do with respect and trust. Trust the liar. Those little lies are told because the liar feels the need to lie, could be for privacy reasons, or in order to protect you from something, or they simply might not want to divulge in the matter any further, for interest reasons.

Using the social context we can notice other things, just as we don't act the same around family as we do as friends we modify our stories to be appropriate, and in saying modify I mean we lie. When you haven't called someone back, do you say "I didn't feel like it" or do you say "I've been a bit busy"? When a meal you're served tastes bad, and you can't finish it, do you say "Oh god, this is disgusting, I can't eat this", or do you say "I had  a big lunch"?

Taking away our lies, completely, is taking away our ability to interact with each other on a civilised basis, one of the things that separates us from animals. One could simply claim that it's human to lie, and that lying defines us as human beings.

I can't remember the details, but I have read articles about lies, that we tell a surprising  amount of lies every day. Then I try to think about what I've lied about, because surely it must have been something. Maybe it's as simple as not knowing and then answering anyway can count as a lie. It borders on the question of what a lie is. When does bending the truth become a lie, and when does not telling become keeping secrets? I suppose keeping secrets falls into that category of social lubrication as well. It goes with being selfish. Our secrets are really only interesting to ourselves, everyone else is too busy with their own.

Personally I'd like to say that if you're asked a direct question and instead of saying "I don't know", or "I'd rather not tell you" that should be something. That kind of integrity deserves respect, not suspicion. Naturally, if there's a matter that directly concerns your wellbeing you should be told the truth and be trusted enough for the other person to know that you can handle the information, but sometimes we should just be grateful that we're important enough to be lied to.