Social Networking

So, less than an hour before posting this (I started writing this 10 minutes after, but well, with typing and stuff, time flies), I saw a status update on Facebook that really was an eyesore. Here it is:

"believe in God but don't pray enough coz He don't believe in me. Still pray for redemption so when I die bury me with a neck full of rosaries and Jesus pieces"

I couldn't let that slide, so I commented:

"WAAAAAA! ZI! I can't let that slide!
belief in God, by definition (to some point), means that God believes in you (If we are talking about the same God worshipped in the Christian faith).
If you're of the opinion that God doesn't believe in you, what makes you think He's going to redeem you. And how does being burried with a bunch of rosiaries going to help you? It's like the Pharaos of Ancient Egypt. Did their gold and servants follow them into the afterlife? Did they help?
And who's to say if you pray enough. Enough for what?" *Forgive the misspelled words, I was in a hurry to get my thought across.

I had posted my comment 5 minutes after he updated his status. I patiently waited for him to notice the comment and explain himself. 10 minutes after his update, he updated something else completely. On looking through my news feed, I was he had been steadily updating stuff for over an hour.

I, of course, began thinking. So... Here we have a social network. Elements of a social network are generally simple: we have a page dedicated to a person, or interesting subject. There's a place for other people or interesting subjects to post stuff and there's a place where the person or interesting subject in question can update a status (generally an interesting thought to be shared with the world). With most of these, there's a chance to comment on the idea.

So, what does this mean for me? It's simple: status updates are interesting things you want your friends/subscribers/stalkers to think about. A comment shows that the audience is interested in the topic at hand, and it's, at the very least, a question of honor and politeness, to reply to the comment and, if possible, post your own, to get a discussion going.

Now, there are, evidently, some people, who appear to miss this point (or I simply have had it all wrong all these years), who simply update stuff for the sake of doing it. But this raises the question: WHY? If it's not important to you what your subscribers/friends/stalkers think of the topic at hand, then WHAT'S THE POINT OF PUTTING THE TOPIC UP AT ALL??? You might as well write it on a piece of paper and then burn it! In fact, writing something on a paper and burning it is a symbol with various meanings, so there may be a point to that, at least! :P

I should be grateful to said friend, though. His pointless gesture gave me a topic to write about (I've been thinking of what to write about, and he gave me the topic).

"You're on Facebook, right?"

This is a question that used to actually have a point, some years ago. It is fast losing importance (if it still has any these days). Social networks, like Facebook are on quite a boom. There are all sorts of statistics on the number of users on Facebook, the number of pages, the number of likes... I'm fast getting tired of these statistics, because after some time even they lose their importance and significance. So now we have a place where we can meet people. We are now in age where most of people's communication and interaction goes on in cyberspace. We have all sorts of ways to communicate with our friends and acquaintances: Facebook, Twitter, Skype, MSN, Yahoo! Messenger... the list is endless! Each has its own pros and cons. Each has a MASSIVE user base. And each one is there to make communicating with people easier. And, indeed, they succeed! Most big companies now know that the internet is the best place to advertise and Social Networks provide the perfect base to have an advertisement go viral.

But where are we going with this? We have all sorts of people in this picture: con artists, activists, politicians, humanitarians, animal rights people, big companies consolidating their customer base, small companies trying to make a big break, individual people, groups... I could go on. Each of these people have their own agenda, be it to steal money, information, accounts, virginities, find friends, make friends, get customers, feed propaganda... Social Networks are powerful tools. And they can be used in any way.

Now, I'm not here to say it's wrong, or point out all the flaws. It is important to mention, however, that people should be careful. Most awesome things these days begin in social networks. But, just as easily can begin terrible things. And, as users, we need to keep in mind, what we're doing and what is our goal. As soon as you start drifting in something this big, you get lost and that's when things get thick.

Now, I've lost my train of thought and probably don't have anything more to rant about, so I'll end there.