I like the post, and if you write novels like you write comments I look forward to reading yours. Regarding my liberal college friend, my interaction with her didn't change when I deleted facebook, and it didn't change when I brought it back to use as a way to coordinate events between large groups of people. At this point I do call her friend in the same sense that one calls a person you speak to once maybe every four months on an idle bus ride and in the process you end up arguing that shame tactics are ineffective. The large problem that I have noticed, and bear in mind I do believe I'm one of the younger members here at the age of 21, is that a great deal of people my age begin to act in the outside world like they would in facebook. I've noticed this especially when having historical arguments or arguments about technological progress. Its a style of debate I really first noticed, and then applied retrospectively to a few other debate I have had in the past, which is absolutely infuriating to argue against, because of how it deals with information. The argument I am speaking about was about the inevitability of technological progress, a view that I disagree with based on my observations of how humanity has led its existence. My point was that technological progress is never a guarantee, that the vast majority of inventions are done as short term solutions to problems, and that when you begin to apply a model of continual progress towards a predetermined goal, you overlook the complexity of the process of invention. The steam engine was not created in order to facilitate an Industrial Revolution or bring about wage labor, it was done to bring factories closer to cities because it was more economical. It was done because coal was becoming cheaper, and because the technology to allow for a much more powerful piston had been recently discovered. The computer was originally designed to make calculations easier for AA guns, because they had to track fast moving objects and needed an equally fast way of doing math. The argument was specifically about electric cars, and I took up the stance that a super battery that could last 3000 miles was unlikely to occur without major changes. I still think the idea is too fundamentally different from how society functions, the travel on demand society that we live in today, to catch on, and the progression to that 3000 mile battery is still not guaranteed, and it is not guaranteed to be cheap. The position my friend, who is smart in most other fields, took was that it would happen because technological progress happens. Because it has happened before in other cases, ergo it would happen again. Very simple logic, very hard to argue with, and easy to repeat. That is the style of facebook arguments. Simple things that can be rehashed because they are easy to understand, but contain very little depth of thought. And its hard to argue with because its so damned frustrating; its like swimming against a current, because the logic reinforces itself without use of further evidence. This is perhaps a bit premature of an evaluation how society is changing, but I have noticed it. The evidence is anecdotal, but still, it might as well be out there.
>The large problem that I have noticed, and bear in mind I do believe I'm one of the younger members here at the age of 21, is that a great deal of people my age begin to act in the outside world like they would in facebook. Right there. That's the money quote. Somebody on Reddit once described me as "taking things too personally, like someone who grew up before the Internet." It was one of the most inadvertently insightful comments I'd ever seen, because they were absolutely right: those of us who grew up "without the internet" regard each other in a completely different way than people who grew up with the internet. I don't think most people understand that. A high school experience pre-Facebook, pre-text message, pre-smartphone is a very, VERY different experience from one that incorporates the digital ecosystem. It's a bigger divide than before/after rock'n'roll, before/after the fall of the Berlin Wall, before/after the telephone. Social interaction in a multi-screened environment is wholly and completely different from social interaction when the coolest thing a phone could be was "cordless." HOWEVER You're also trying to have a substantive discussion in a format that declares every carriage return to be a new message. C'mon. Facebook is the thunderous essence of triviality. It isn't designed for deep thought, it's designed for "deep thoughts." Discussing the intricacies of battery technology and their impact on transport on Facebook is kind of like listening to Mussorgsky as recorded by one of those roll-your-own talking greeting cards. The results are going to be a tinny, horrific facsimile of beauty no matter how much you work at it. For a lot of people one paragraph is all they need to say their piece. Give them two and they'll be reduced to a digital case of the umms. More than that, the power of conformity will push them into limiting what they have to say to that paragraph - after all, how many people are going to click on the "keep reading" button so that they'll click through to the "like" button? It's like this: McDonald's has terrible burgers. If you go there looking for a good burger you will be disappointed every time. And yes - if all your friends like to go to McDonald's for their burgers, their palate for decent cooking will atrophy. But as someone who isn't 21, allow me to observe that there are a whole bunch of people in the world that will never. fucking. matter. And to be perfectly honest, it terrifies me to belong to their number. So I strive for more. Clearly, so do you. There are likely people amongst your Facebook friends that feel as you do. Facebook, however, remains the most terrible place you could imagine for determining who they are. Lead a life of substance and do not sweat the trivialities. "You can tell the size of a man by the size of the thing that makes him mad." - Adlai Stevenson PS. Assigned reading, whippersnapper: http://www.amazon.com/Evolution-Useful-Things-Artifacts-Zipp... http://www.amazon.com/Alone-Together-Expect-Technology-Other...
And you're delusional if you think that you'll ever "fucking matter."
Your gripes sound like many of them are to do with society, and not specifically FB, even if FB makes them more acute. One thing thinking people must learn and try to come to terms with as they age is that most people don't want, and anyway aren't capable of having, an honest, subtle, in depth conversation. This is a cynical and perhaps narcissistic world view, but its also helped me cope with daily life. Give unto Caesar, if you catch my drift.