I do have an addictive personality, I admit it, but usually its chocolate. Currently though, I have been bitten by the Facebook bug.
When I first got my profile set up a few months ago, I was bemused by it - my kids thought I was spying on them and got all twitchy, my much younger siblings removed my comments from their photos and their ‘walls’ - clearly I was way too old, uncool and totally weird to be associated with. For a while I thought I was the oldest person on Facebook, then I discovered a load of old(ish) Druids that I know on there as well, and I was away (I really can’t see the point of having ‘friends’ that I don’t even know)!
So now I am completely drawn into all the superpoking, hugging, throwing strawberries at, feeling the force with, being green with and having largely inane conversations with people who I know to be spiritual and erudite, feeling all included and fuzzy when I get sent friend hugs and karma etc. Sending love hearts to my other half who is sitting with his laptop in the same room. What’s more, doing extremely silly online quizzes and finding out what my aura colour is, sending people ‘gifts’ which are actually just little pictures of cute bunnies etc and feeling all satisfied about it. How extremely odd.
Facebooking is the second most popular thing among undergraduates, tied with beer and only ranked lower than the ipod! You can believe it - and there are 70 million users worldwide taking part for hours daily in this extremely addictive displacement activity.
Employers disapprove of it, marketeers love it for all that data - Facebook Inc have to make their money somehow! I make sure that my profile is only accessible to my friends and am careful about privacy. I worry that my kids have everything there for all to see, including pouting pictures of overt self absorbed behaviour - you know the thing.
My innate caution and cynicism is very aroused by Facebook - and yet I can’t help myself. Back to my ‘notifications’…
