Facebook! The Site I Love to Hate
Here’s why
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Why I Joined Facebook: The Good
When I joined Facebook around 2008 it was because I wanted to connect with old friends I’d lost track of and distant family and friends I rarely get to see. Maybe you joined for the same reason. It’s fun to see who my ex-students became, who they married, and what they look like now. I enjoy knowing how my friends spend their days and where they live. I love seeing photos of their children and grandchildren. I no longer miss out on important milestones in their lives. We can support each other in times of grief — even across the miles. We can also share happy times and joke around with each other.
Facebook makes it easy to update several friends at once on what’s happening in our lives. We cannot possibly write to everyone we care about — even by email. It takes time to express ourselves about things that matter to us. Facebook fills in some of the gaps.
My Writing Life Changed My Facebook Experience
Not long after I joined Facebook, I started writing online at Squidoo. I was also part of one of its networking groups, RocketMoms. Those of us who were RocketMoms became very close to each other. Even after the demise of Squidoo, we continued to communicate. One of the ways we did that was through Facebook. Some of us still blog together on Review This Reviews.
A few months after I started networking with other Squidoo writers, I heard about HubPages. Soon I was writing there and meeting many other writers on that platform. Many of us joined new emerging platforms and social networks, most of which died after a year or two. Yes, I belonged to Zurker, Tsu, Bubblews, Niume, and many of the smaller sites that have since disappeared. At each site I became acquainted with new people who started sending me friend requests on Facebook. I readily accepted many of them I really thought of as friends. Too many more, though, had names I didn’t recognize. To accept or not to accept. That was the question. I accepted more than I should have so as not to offend anyone.
It’s easy to cross the boundary between friends and acquaintances, personal and business. Joining Facebook networking groups helped solve this problem with new…
