I’m just wondering whether you’d all consider how much time you actually spend using FaceBook (or, as I call it, FaceHook). I’m sitting here, realizing that I’ve finished reading my blogs for the day, and that I do have homework to do, but that I’m missing the fiddling about, being a voyeur into the “lives” of those people who are on FB. So. How much time do you spend on there, anyway? What do you get out of it? Do you really feel like you’re connecting to people? Do you have lasting, deep friendships because of it?
7 Replies to “How much time does it take you…”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
Spending far too much time watching my trees bear fruit, moving cattle, landscaping. Case of mild doll-house envy I guess. It was oddly soothing though. But ridiculous so I cold turkey-ed Farmville (?!) and noticed a drop in FB-time as well. Same for Twitter. Don’t miss it. Do skype and mail. Find I’m better at old fashioned wordy mails than 40-character soundbites. Connecting no, fleeting yes, comforting to reach out and get replies yes. Addictive but not essential..
I spend quite a lot of time on it at the moment. I spend at least an hour at a time feeding Cooper just now and it is very tedious, so facebook and farmville have been a saving grace and it is much easier than trying to hold a book at the same time as a baby.
I like hearing little snippets of everyones lives and I have found it useful in keeping up with other mums from my anti-natal group. Lots of late night chats, giving and receiving advice and keeping each other sane, whilst everyone else sleeps.
Well, I figure it like this: Facebook is sort of like having neighbors. I see my neighbors usually when we’re heading in our out of the property (can’t see any of them from our yard). We exchange a pleasantry or two, catch up on whatever is the latest neighborhood news, ie. “Did you HEAR that sheep bleating last night”? Maybe we hand out some eggs. This takes barely two minutes. But I feel like I’ve said hello, and I’m up to date on what’s happening with them.
Facebook seems much the same. Most of the time, it’s stuff I am NOT interested in: Farmville, balloons, quizzes, whatever is going around. Occasionally I’ll get an interesting pass-along story of link. But for the most part, I get a glimpse into what so and so is doing. I just ran a 5k whoo hoo! Or, making crumpets for the first time. Or photos from a trip. This works for me.
That said, I’m still leaving once my new blog is up. Because the glimpses of anything of value, at least in my estimation, are fewer and father between. I have to get through pages of Farmville and other stuff to get to the items of interest, and since I don’t look all that often, I mis most of the good stuff anyway. It is easier, and convenient (I can post stuff directly to facebook from almost anywhere now. But that said, there is no continuity, and no sense of “who I am” or, for that matter, of “who anyone really is”. And I find that increasingly frustrating.
Besides. I’ve discovered another time waster: Mahjongg Solitaire! It will help sharpen my mind. Really.
I’m glad that you’re opting to leave it, though. So many feel that they just can’t make that leap – that they can’t communicate without it. That’s the really strange part, to me: they probably communicate with their neighbors well enough, when they run into them. Why think that it’d be difficult to take the time to send an email, rather than being able to “see” them on FB?
Do you remember, a few years ago there was this whole thing about tracking cookies? People were all up in arms, because their behavior was going to be monitored? Somehow we’ve all forgotten about that, because that’s exactly what they’re proposing to do, except they’ll also be eavesdropping in your conversations with the neighbor, so they’ll try to market something to you which takes care of bleating sheep, soon as you know it.
I’ve basically stopped Twitter altogether…I still log into Facebook a few times a day and scroll through. I don’t feel the ‘need’ to see what every person is up to. If I want to communicate, I go to my gmail and send a message…I can’t stand the ‘inbox’ on Facebook. The security issues have me concerned and it is quite possible that I too will be leaving for good.
The positive thing about it is being able to connect with folks from my home town. I come from a very small community and being in touch with those folks, however minimally, has been nice.
: )
Yep, I understand wanting to remain connected to people from back home. That’s the hard part about disconnecting from it, for me. I’m trying to make more of an effort, though, because I don’t have the illusion of being connected any longer.
I’ve enjoyed reconnecting with high school friends on FB and it’s been a good professional networking tool. And it’s been a great way to stay in touch with former students. I also have set up my news feed to show only the people whose news I care about and deleted all those annoying applications, so I don’t have to know about pirates or farms or fish.
And I will always have a loyalty to FB because it’s how I found out about my cheating ex.