Confessions of a (former) Facebook Resistor

I have finally succumbed to the pressures and jumped on the Facebook bandwagon. It took over 3 years for me to give in, during which I was one of the proud few that were "not on Facebook." But it was starting to get ridiculous. In addition to the constant pressures of various friends, I would frequently get comments like:

"I forgot about you because you're not on Facebook."
"You should join Facebook so we can keep in touch!"
"I actually was worried that you were dead because I couldn't find you on Facebook." (not a joke)

It's crazy actually, the degree to which people nowadays seem to rely on this one website to conduct their social lives. Everyone has told me that it makes staying in touch sooooo much easier, so I'm curious to see how many friends come back into my life now that I have joined. I can say that email has not been very good for staying in touch, because you actually have to make the effort to write email to whoever you want to stay in touch with.

So why did I hold out for so long? I think I have to blame MySpace actually. I joined MySpace shortly before Facebook came around, and while it did serve some useful purposes, for the most part I despised MySpace. The clunky profiles that crashed my computer, the awkward interface, the prevailing sense of ego and desperate struggle to assert some sort of identity...the exact reason that teens love it was the reason that I hated it. I found that every time I used MySpace, I was left with this feeling that everyone else was cooler than I was and having much more fun. How lame is that?

So when FB first came out, and people started telling me how much better it was, I wanted nothing to do with it. I didn't need another thing to make me spend more time on the computer, and MS had left such a bad taste in my mouth. Plus, I started getting these emails from people who I barely knew inviting me to join FB, which I found to be really, really invasive. I hated the idea of a site that raided your email list to recruit more users. So I made a decision not to join.

And as time went on, the FB force started to grow. Around the time that I was in Japan, I started to notice a tinge of shock and confusion in peoples' reactions when I told them I was not on FB. "You're not on Facebook? (looking at me like I was an alien) WHY??" And that made it even more of a turn-off for me - the fact that people expected me to be on there; as if it was this requirement to be a normal person. It really brought out the subversive counter-culture side of me (thanks Berkeley!), and I despised the idea of becoming a part of it.

I also had a few friends that were obsessed with it in a very unhealthy way, checking it every 5 minutes and essentially using it to stalk people. I noticed that people used it to actually conduct their social lives and maintain their friendships, which honestly freaked me out. Why do I need a website to manage my social life for me? I worry that in this internet world that we rely too much on computers for too many things, and the fact that socialization is now taking place more and more online rather than face-to-face is really unnerving to me.

But at some point .... my resistance started to crumble. I can't say what it was, probably because it was a lot of factors. The fact that I have a lot more time on my hands right now was huge actually - not only do I now have time to spend maintaining friendships on the internet, I also have time to actually SEE old friends, which is really nice. There are some people from way back in my life that I have no way of getting in touch with, and FB is my only hope. I have sort of shifted my perception of FB - rather than be annoyed by the fact that people rely on it to stay in touch, I am starting to think of it as a helpful tool that really does make sense in this day and age.

And honestly, part of it was just curiousity - I don't go a day without seeing a FB reference in the news -- its one of the biggest cultural phenomena of our time, and I want to see what all the fuss is about!

So after weeks of deliberation, I finally joined today. Within an hour, I was back in touch with a generous handful of old friends, and I know there are a LOT more to come over the next few weeks. I've gotten messages from people that would not answer my recent emails because they prefer FB. I've learned that an old high school friend got married, and another had a child. And the addiction factor - well, I'm already doing that thing where I check my email every 10 minutes to see if there are FB updates. Oh no!!! Hopefully that will wear off over time, but I doubt it.

One thing that I do not want to get in the habit of doing is checking my FB while I am with other people. Whether it is when my bf is at my house, or I am out to dinner with friends, I am still uncomfortable with the idea of taking attention away from the people who are actually in the room with me to give attention to people online. That is just creepy, and it reminds of the portral of the future in Wall-E, where people communicate using screens attached to their easy-chairs.

Welcome to the future!