Facebook : stalking or showing off? (part 1)

Well, today I wake up like usual. Yes, I got up very late, at 11 am. Upss,, hey,, chill out ! I slept very late last night. I had and still have to do my assignments. And first thing I did this morning was just a daily ritual. Yeah,, checking out my emails. And you know what?? I had almost 50 notifications just from Facebook. What??? Can u imagine that?? And none of them was an “actual” email. Well actually, there was an email from my lecturer saying that “hey citra I’ve got a link that can be useful for your research paper.” Ohh,, how nice he is, isn’t he?? However, my boyfriend hasn’t replied on my email which I sent it yesterday. *sigh*

Then, basically you can guest what I did next. That’s right. I opened my facebook account: checking my friend requests which I have 83 friends requests I haven’t approved because I don’t know who the hell these people are, looking at my notifications which I have almost 60 announcements, and posting a silly shout-out commenting something about a daylight saving is over finally (and in seconds I’ve got responses from my cousin and an old friend of mine). There are 2 friends posting their crazy picture and what on earth I’m in those pictures?? Yeah they have tagged me, which I knew it’s just their way to gain people’s attention and to humiliate or ridicule (whatsoever) people. And I am wondering how on earth people can spend their time just commenting on those ridiculous pictures.

Ok. One day, I looked at my News Feed and like usual there are a great deal of notifications: people just took a quiz, people made new friends with somebody whoever they are, and people shouting on their status which is actually I want to say “do I care??” (but I don’t know why I still give my response on to it). Nonetheless, I still enjoy facebooking somehow. Well, I was interested in a news feed about my friend saying something on my other friend’s wall. She said she was astounded that my other friend is dating with my female friend’s sister. And you must be wondering how I knew that was true. On their news feed, there is a link “see wall-to-wall” and I just clicked on it and there you go, u can see all of the posting they have made. And I was like, “what??? Is it just like this?? Ok, if I can stalk on someone’s privacy, then someone else can do the same at me???” oh no !! I’m in a huge danger, I reckon.

Additionally, today I read an email (actually I received it 3 days ago which I hadn’t read it) from my friend. In his email, there’s an attachment “puisi ibu dan facebook” (In English, it means a poet about mom and facebook). I downloaded it but unfortunately I was able to see it partly. Then, I went to youtube and typed a keyword which was just like a title. Here is the link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBi8JbwI5wA&feature=related. If you click on it, I bet you will laugh because you must admit it that in a certain way the video is just absolutely true. This link is just fantastic.. I recommend you to click on it *grin*

Furthermore, I started to think a new phenomenon in Indonesia. Don’t you ever think why people are dying to have Blackberry?? And I went on to a question, do they really need it? In a certain extent, they do need it, but for others like teenagers what do they have it for? For facebooking, indeed. Well, some of friends of mine spontaneously update their facebook status just after they get up from bed (and I have to admit, I do that sometimes, Haha,,). They even do that probably for shooing their boredom away. And you are supposed to be wondering what means they use, yeah that's right, their Blackberry. In other words, they would rather utilise their Blackberry just to do facebooking than to check something on the news today. This might sound sarcastic, but perhaps they do not even care to what is happening on Situ Gintung. And well I would have thought that at the moment, in Indonesia, people are suffering from Facebook. Indeed, it would be better if we claim that symptom as facebook fever.

Don’t you ever think that every people now have a facebook account. Even my uncles, my aunts (luckily my parents haven’t got ones), my old relatives, my TEACHERS, my LECTURERS, my cousins, my friends, and even my friends who DIDN'T AGREE about social networking BEFORE. *sigh* what is this phenomenon supposed to mean??

Everybody has a facebook account: celebrities, shops, businesses, and so forth. Thus we have to take into account that facebook is more popular than Friendster (do you still remember that?). Facebook is becoming like a lifestyle: you make friends, you keep I touch with them and you share your pictures and give comments on those. Those things are supposed to be enjoyable. However, have you ever thought that people can impersonate your profile by grabbing your pictures fraudulently?? (is that a correct adverb? Well yeah you know what I mean). What I mean is people (even if indeed they are your friends) can stalk on you by checking your profile regularly just to see what is going on with you. A feature like news feed (relationship status, wall-to-wall, profile status) enables people to see what has been occurring to other people.

In a certain extent, facebook is just spectacular. I can keep in touch with my friends from all over the world (friends who I went to college abroad with) and my old friends from my junior and senior even elementary school. Isn’t that stupendous?? Wow,, Well, I would like to ask you to think that have you ever thought that Facebook is somehow threatening or even violating your privacy and stalking on whatever you do?? Even my boyfriend would rather spend most of his time making friends and doing some ridiculous things on facebook than replying my emails in which because of Facebook I just have one email each day.. *sigh*

To be continued,,,
(Sydney, 5 April 2009)