The present generation has widely accepted the Facebook website as an essential vehicle for interacting with one another. With this new communication medium, there are marked changes in traditional forms of communication: invitations to parties, birthday notes, all of which were once handwritten and mailed with authenticity, are now being digitally transcribed and delivered electronically. Consequently, personal information is abundantly available and used in this new form of hyper communication amongst peer groups. Facebook enables one to manage hundreds of relationships simultaneously, providing a centralized, convenient repository of known people from different parts of life. An individual’s list of friends on the site often consists of both close and distant friends, family members, and coworkers. Facebook uses algorithms to predict who an individual’s friends may be and displays them prominently in an effort to confirm the relationship. Undoubtedly, the site has an interest in connecting everyone to everyone else. Participation on the site is marginally necessary as merely having an account will ensure shocking encounters with long lost friends or family. Conflict is inevitable as one’s identity from reality is transposed onto a virtual medium where the absence of boundaries reveal unspeakable truths. The efficiencies and practical applications of Facebook are all highly spoken of while the effect it has on identity is seldom mentioned.
Outside of the virtual world, group interactions are different in that there’s a common understanding of what ideal behavior is and how one should act in the company of a specific group or situation. In “Many masks, many selves,” Wendy Doniger describes how our behavior is influenc...
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...n essence, seeing the strings that tie the mask together may cause one to lose respect for an otherwise close friend. Then there’s how you act on Facebook, your choice of words, your status updates, and of course, how much time outside of your real life that you devote to the social networking site. It’s alarming that people elect to spend a substantial amount of time on Facebook, rather than in real world social interactions. It’s easy for one to become trapped inside the virtual Facebook reality where they lose touch with who they are in real life.
With all of these negative aspects of Facebook, it’s not surprising that many people opt to detach themselves from the chaos. Unfortunately, today’s society is very much dependent on social network websites such as Facebook, and in the process of expunging a Facebook identity, one can be ostracized from their peers.
Ever since the dawn of time, people have been communicating with others around them and with today’s technology people can interconnect with people across the globe. They have access to a wider range of peers and colleagues like no other time period and the possibilities continue to advance these communications. Yet as those in the world continue to make new friends and hear the opinions of more people they slowly develop a dual personality. Though people have always had parallel identities, one for family and friend, and another for acquaints and strangers, as Barbara Mellix points out in her essay. Mellix is a writer and educator who’s essay “From the Outside, In” tells how she grew up learning two identities so she could function in both her personal world with close family and friends, and her world that dealt with others. Now as the world of the others has expanded with the help of technology so has the use of the second identity and it has taken the form of the online identity. People’s second online identity is always on an aggressive defense, paranoid to the point of any wrong thing said or unsaid could lead to a fight, and they tend to only be happy when there is someone to attack. In the physical world where people are surrounded by true friends and people they trust with their emotions and they are more caring and sympathetic of others’ pain. However the online identity poses a threat to the personal identity as people begin to pull traits from one identity to the next. Although not having an online identity Mellix can relate to this with an experience that involved confusing her identities. Mellix describes how when her personalities become mixed, she was puzzled about who she was and who belonged in her personal iden...
One’s amount of Facebook reflects how popular one wish to appear online more than how healthy one’s friendship truly is. Constant usage of Facebook allows user to potentially feel like they have a meaningful social life, when in reality, they are missing something. In Stephen Marche’s 2102 article, “Is Facebook making Us Lonely?” he notes that Facebook was introduced to the world in the midst of spreading and intensifying loneliness, an idea to which he greatly attributes Facebook’s appeal and success (Marche 26). Initially, social networking sites seem to be evidence of modern-day social interaction being easier and more convenient than ever.
Before the internet, our characteristics such as style, identity, and values were primarily exposed by our materialistic properties which psychologists define as the extended self. But people’s inferences to the idea of online self vs. offline self insisted a translation to these signals into a personality profile. In today’s generation, many of our dear possessions have been demolished. Psychologist Russell W belk suggest that: “until we choose to call them forth, our information, communications, photos, videos, music, and more are now largely invisible and immaterial.” Yet in terms of psychology there is no difference between the meaning of our “online selves” and “offline selves. They both assist us in expressing important parts of our identity to others and provide the key elements of our online reputation. Numerous scientific research has emphasized the mobility of our analogue selves to the online world. The consistent themes to these studies is, even though the internet may have possibly created an escape from everyday life, it is in some ways impersonating
“I didn't know what Facebook was, and now that I do know what it is, I have to say, it sounds like a huge waste of time –Betty White (“Betty White Quotes,” 2014, para. 1).” This quote can be interpreted to fit with several of the social media avenues that many people spend their time on. Day in and day out people post, tweet, share, and pin countless times throughout the world. These different forms of communication were first created for an easier way for people to connect with others. Yet now, so much time is spent on these social sites that it has warped the interactive part and is causing more damage than good. Many are growing a desire and are living for the amount of “likes” they can receive on a post or how many re-tweets they can generate. Instead of going to these outlets to participate in a partial portion of their social lives, people are filling that time with the technological aspect of communication. As White said, this can become an inordinate amount of wasted time and can ultimately grow into further damaging circumstances. These different social media channels can cause emotional harm through disparaging the relationship between friends, conjuring of a narcissistic personality, and the retrogradation of ones self-esteem.
Catfish poses the question “How well do we really know our Facebook friends?” (Eshbach, Teklits, Hoover) we know people based on their mutual likes and interests, but Facebook brings together people that actually do have no have common interests, just by saying “yeah I know that person, we’re Facebook friends”, there is more to actually knowing a person than what Facebook promotes. Angela shows this example of how the internet allows a person to be what they want over who they actually are, such as how online she is young and pretty and her real life contradicts that, “contriving a personality as a means of escape is not necessarily a negative outlet, creating a friend-base off one does not line up with what friendship should be.” (Eshbach,
Welcome to Facebook. Make yourself comfortable as with each status, piece of information, and picture, you are slowly, but surely, more and more under the power of others. Why, you might ask? Isn’t Facebook just a great, flexible, free blog that one can use to create a virtual identity and keep up with everyone? Well, remember how they say that knowledge is power? Exactly. Everyday, you and your friends give Facebook the power to know your likes and dislikes, where you are from, colleges attended, pictures with you at every stage, and even where you are right now. Think about the new Timeline design: you have provided Facebook with all the information needed to map out your own life from birth to where you are now. Let’s take a look at Michel Foucault’s insights on Panopticism and you might think twice about who really has the power on this social network and if you are a Facebook user, or being used…
Most social networks make it possible for individuals to upload their entire life to a public profile. You’re not only sharing personal information with your friends but also the friends of your friends. Personal information spreads rapidly on a Social Networking Site than through a real-life network and sometimes provides more information than we would have thought. A social networking site is defined as a network of individuals related to each other based on a common interest or a real-life connection. The popularity of these sites introduces the use of a new and easy form of communication. People spend countless hours interacting with their ‘friends’ on these sites with the help of a ‘comment’ and a ‘like’ button.
The 21st century has brought a lot of modern ideas, innovations, and technology. One of these is social media. The invention of Facebook has completely changed the way we communicate with one another. Instant messaging, photo sharing, and joining online groups have created a way for families and friends to connect. Some argue that Facebook is the greatest invention however, while it is seemingly harmless, Facebook has created an invasion of privacy. The accessibility of Facebook and its widespread use has created privacy problems for users, teens, and interviewees by allowing easy control to viewers.
This paper aims to explore the different reasons behind people having different personas in Twitter and real-life through a look at how the social networking site provides a unique opportunity for self...
and family, and also “meet like-minded people” ( Metz, par. 1). In some cases, business people such as Ron West, claim that he uses Facebook “to become acquainted with new customers”( par. 8). Yes, these types of websites are great tools to stay in touch with old classmatesand faraway family members. It is a great source of communication, but there is always a con to every pro. Even though users are connecting with others, users of social networks never know exact...
When someone “friends you” on Facebook, it doesn’t automatically mean that you have some special relationship with that person. In reality it really doesn’t mean that you now have the intimacy and familiarity that you have with some offline friends. And research shows that people don’t commonly accept friend requests from or send them to people they don’t really know, favoring instead to have met a person at least once (Jones). A key part of interpersonal communication is impression management, and some methods of new media allow people more tools for presenting themselves than others. SNSs in many ways are podiums for self-presentation. Even more than blogs, web pages, and smartphones, the atmosphere on a SNS like Facebook and Twitter enables self-disclosure in a focused way and permits others who have access to ones profile to see their other friends. This merging of different groups of people that include close friends, family, acquaintances, and friends of friends, colleagues, and strangers can present issues for self-presentation. Once people have personal, professional, and academic contacts in their Facebook network the growing diversity of social media networks creates new challenges as people try to engage in impression management
In Betty White’s opening monologue to Saturday Night Live, she said, “I didn’t know what Facebook was, and now that I do know what it is, I have to say, it sounds like a huge waste of time. I would never say the people on it are losers, but that’s only because I’m polite.” Originally intended for the use of students at Harvard University in 2004, Facebook grew exponentially to be an online phenomenon in the years following. In 2006, it became accessible to anyone and everyone with internet connection. Aside from the advantages that give the site its popularity, creating a profile comes with a number of significant disadvantages inherit to online social networks. What do more than 500 million active users use their Facebook for? Communicating with long distance friends and spreading awareness of causes are common responses. Unfortunately, Facebook has it flaws, from limiting the privacy of relationships to creating a form of almost unmanageable bullying, making one reconsider their involvement and think, “do I really want my Facebook account?”
In this day and age, many individuals simply cannot go without some sort of socialization. Specifically speaking, most participate in online social networking sites. The most popular and used one is commonly known as Facebook. Facebook was created in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg. By 2007, Facebook had over 21 million users, adding up to 1.6 billion page views every single day. The typical user spends over twenty minutes per day on Facebook and two thirds of the users log in every day at least once. It is not questionable as to why many people have a Facebook account. Facebook is generally efficient, easy for socialization, and not difficult to manage. Most organizations are affiliated with Facebook, as “almost 22,000 organizations had Facebook directories,” as of November 2006. A year after that in 2007, Facebook was named the seventh most popular website (Ellison 1). However, with anything well known, many oppose to using Facebook and hold criticism against the popular network. There are many flaws in the website and the relationships it starts online. Facebook is risking dangerous activities, ignoring privacy laws, and demeaning healthy socialization.
The popular site, Facebook.com, has amassed more than one billion registrants since it started in February 2004. It is another social networking site, just like MySpace.com and Xanga.com, which is common to High School and College students. But this is no ordinary site; people’s lives literally revolve around Facebook. I have a Facebook account and log in at least once a day. I personally believe that Facebook is a fun and interactive site. However, some students may not feel that same way because they have encountered some negative aspects, aside from Facebook’s legal problems.
With more than 500 million active users, the site is a warehouse of personal information. Personal profiles allow users to provide information about their name, age, hometown, relationship status, activities, job, school, and more. They can connect with the others’ profiles and become ”friends”. Combined with a profile picture, you can pretty much learn anything you want to know about somebody over Facebook (should they choose to provide the information). However, what many users fail to realize is that in most cases this information is not only available to their “friends”. Though users can change their privacy settings to limit with whom their profile information is shared, the site gathers and stores more than most of us want to acknowledge. For instance, the Facebook “Like” butto...