It rains it thunders it showers it drizzles it pours ... all at its will. anytime anywhere.
Love to hate.
Wednesday, September 11, 2013
My Facebook Experiences : Using and Deleting !
Disclaimer: Generally people say "It doesn't matter as long as you don't give importance to it or don't make a daily routine... Whole world is using it and what stops you from using it ?"
To those: That thing "whole world". Get over it.
Ok, Get it right ...Click my Facebook profile link on the left ...
Waht ?? Not working ?? "This content is currently unavailable"
YES ! that's precisely the reason why you are reading this blog.
This is interesting and long story short I deleted it. Whoaaa.. 2500+ photos, 400+ friends, admin of 7 pages and thousands of pagelikes. Has he blocked me? Has he gone mad? Is he troubled or facing any tough time? Has he become psycho? (well that's what all your FB friends think "first thing" when they couldn't find you anymore on social networking)
Since 2010 it picked up, Posting frequent updates, sharing photos & videos, ranting out daily, keeping away for weeks, Showing and hiding stuff, restricting updates and bombarding others daily, posting opinions on owned pages, spamming, promoting pages, creating groups, events and so on ... All this started giving new insights about social networking, personal space, building relationships and understanding how it works and affects the relationships.
It's quite interesting. "Facebook is a real society." Declare it ...may be a showmanship country. But like a real society it feeds itself on your life span. The time you give to it out of your life.
"The expression of experience takes the priority than experiencing the moment itself." A lot can be said about this, but when we hear at tourist places "Hey take my profile pic here.." "Let's take a cover photo ..come everyone .." enough!
Well I like to be social, I'm an ENTJ and I must draw my energy from the external world. To top it, I'm a hobby photographer and like to share my clicks. Yet I'm choosing to stay away from Facebook. There are numerous reasons and I will detail it out...
2. News Feed that fades away your time. : Constant updates on timeline makes you a spectator than a doer. Sometimes you are on the other side but that doesn’t make you wise either. This itself is the most effective reason to stay away. I tried to control the news feed but it's useless to have a blank news feed. Human mind doesn’t work that way. Once you are there you must get all the updates. No matter how repetitive and irrelevant they are to you. Moreover it's not educating you or letting you form your own opinions. In non FB days people were more inclined to read and focus on what they like, now we keep on reading junk photo messages which may be funny but low in taste(most of them) and non educative. We spend hours reading some "Page Admins" views on status quo and keep on sharing them. This surely degrades our own appetite for learning. Feeding mostly on the comic, satire and sarcasm makes you psychologically unbalanced. You must have noticed, People generally (mostly) use Facebook for celebration of victories, happy stories, achievements, travelogs, purchases, happy life events, meetups or anything that like (seldom we come across heartbroken lovers who keep on sharing sad poetry n songs). This constant dose of happiness is what makes you restless. It asks your subconscious to push harder to stay afloat in this Happy wave. With a little introspection it wont be hard to believe in this fact. Haven't it made you miserable when sometimes you see -your dreams, someone else is achieving?
3. Facebook doesn't care for your privacy. : This is reason enough. Since Facebook's inception, it has changed privacy policies and settings every year, making you more public and thus more vulnerable.The sense of getting spied is getting stronger. Every search of yours every keystroke is monitored, and if I'm guessing it correctly: There's a meta-profile of every individual with Facebook. It probably knows more about you than your closest friends. A online activity cannot be undone, it only propagates leaving more traces. Facebook servers must be full of such traces and they are using it freely to target you. I'm not even touching cookies here. That's a whole different story. Heard of Facebook bug bounty program? Well it doesn't address your genuine concerns over privacy, automated friend requests being sent or allowing any new profile/app to take over your and your friends personal information. The more open your profile is, the more profit they get through advertisements. Why would they pay attention to these loopholes? These are the means of Facebook's earnings.
Ok, there are ways to protect your privacy up-to some extent but that makes you manipulative and untrustworthy. In a open society people talk and share with each other. Hiding things from select people (or sharing with few) wont do any good to you in this scenario.
5. Any surprises. : NO we know about everything the moment it happens, on Facebook.
6. Tag me : Ohh yes and get blocked. Why on earth everyone should know about every person I hang out with. Places, people, likes, dislikes, food, clothing, music, movies, books everything is shared to everyone out there. Why ..because we like to and we don’t give a damn about privacy. And even if we do, Facebook keeps updating their privacy policies and uses all the information we provide in numerous ways to benefit them and corporate eyeing for our personal data. It's simple thumb rule "Nothing comes for free in this world."
7. Unwanted friends & followers. : This happens with lucky few (and mostly with beautiful girls). Haven’t you seen hundreds of followers in a profile (thank god if your friend request is accepted). Those are the one's hopelessly waiting to get added. Funny but true. Same goes with friend requests from unknown people, spammers, sponsored ads and promotions. Unwanted Likes? yes that’s also new age problem. Do it never or do it always. Go on a "Liking" spree or stay quite, if you choose to be selective ..wait for the payback or silent treatment.
8. Real-time availability. : The moment you post something on Facebook, you give away knowingly or unknowingly your location details (to Facebook always & sometimes to all) and your availability. You might not be in a mood to start conversation but Some people just wait to message at the same moment and might get offended if you don’t promptly respond. Well isn't it annoying? Moreover you cant pretend that you are sleeping because the update says "It's midnight and I'm preparing Maggi noodles..." real gotcha !
The list can go further because there are deep caveats of human mind and sociopsychological influences at work.
It might turn out to be useful tool if used carefully and with balance. But again human mind is not that helpful, it makes you wander haplessly whenever possible and it's carefree & limitless. Striking right balance is always questionable too, everyone has a different threshold. On other side, Facebook is high on exploiting personal details, interactions. The Observer pattern is turning out to be "Loudspeaker" pattern. Facebook is trying to be everything- Twitter, Flickr, Yahoo IM, Instagram, Blogger, Skype... they all served different purposes without crossing the lines and letting one express freely in that particular space. Facebook invaded those boundaries, by connecting all the dots they destroyed ecosystem. It looks convenient in first glance, but it's treacherous. One monolith giant trying to track all online activities of a person. They can reveal a lot about a person or just provide information for money. Hope it finds sense of privacy and personal space only then I might reconsider to ponder upon it again.
I have seen most of it or should I say used it to the highest possible extent ... but now I don’t want to see more. Call me psycho...whatever. I don't care. For now I'm not returning back.
Nearing the end of this blog, Thank you for being good reader, now the million dollar question...
So how does it feel after deleting, well... ask yourself, how you ever felt before having one.
Reclaim the calm.
-ciao
To those: That thing "whole world". Get over it.
Ok, Get it right ...Click my Facebook profile link on the left ...
Waht ?? Not working ?? "This content is currently unavailable"
YES ! that's precisely the reason why you are reading this blog.
This is interesting and long story short I deleted it. Whoaaa.. 2500+ photos, 400+ friends, admin of 7 pages and thousands of pagelikes. Has he blocked me? Has he gone mad? Is he troubled or facing any tough time? Has he become psycho? (well that's what all your FB friends think "first thing" when they couldn't find you anymore on social networking)
BUT Believe me, everything is all-rite and it's a decision taken in full consciousness.
Facebook is new age "social" experiment. Yes, It is.
We were not born when the society came into existence. We were part of it the moment we came to existence. Now see it through this experiment, When you came on this social platform, how you used to share things freely when there were not many people using it, as time passed, it got more concrete.. all your family members are there, your colleagues, your near/far and dear/non-dear ones ... Don't you now think once before sharing things (social obligations)? Worst it is for the infants & kids... even before they know anything they have profiles on Facebook, they are getting it as legacy... legacy ..that's traditional society thing. So they don't get the freedom to choose there social environment because they already have one... and who are their friends, the friends of their parents and their kids.... a lot of parental control since the beginning. Ohh yeah ..now you know what I'm getting at. Think about it you can draw umpteen parallels.
Facebook is new age "social" experiment. Yes, It is.
We were not born when the society came into existence. We were part of it the moment we came to existence. Now see it through this experiment, When you came on this social platform, how you used to share things freely when there were not many people using it, as time passed, it got more concrete.. all your family members are there, your colleagues, your near/far and dear/non-dear ones ... Don't you now think once before sharing things (social obligations)? Worst it is for the infants & kids... even before they know anything they have profiles on Facebook, they are getting it as legacy... legacy ..that's traditional society thing. So they don't get the freedom to choose there social environment because they already have one... and who are their friends, the friends of their parents and their kids.... a lot of parental control since the beginning. Ohh yeah ..now you know what I'm getting at. Think about it you can draw umpteen parallels.
I created profile when Facebook was not at all popular ... Very first among my friends, back in 2008. It was QUITE. No Buzz.
Since 2010 it picked up, Posting frequent updates, sharing photos & videos, ranting out daily, keeping away for weeks, Showing and hiding stuff, restricting updates and bombarding others daily, posting opinions on owned pages, spamming, promoting pages, creating groups, events and so on ... All this started giving new insights about social networking, personal space, building relationships and understanding how it works and affects the relationships.
It's quite interesting. "Facebook is a real society." Declare it ...may be a showmanship country. But like a real society it feeds itself on your life span. The time you give to it out of your life.
"The expression of experience takes the priority than experiencing the moment itself." A lot can be said about this, but when we hear at tourist places "Hey take my profile pic here.." "Let's take a cover photo ..come everyone .." enough!
Well I like to be social, I'm an ENTJ and I must draw my energy from the external world. To top it, I'm a hobby photographer and like to share my clicks. Yet I'm choosing to stay away from Facebook. There are numerous reasons and I will detail it out...
1. Facebook makes you a public entity. : Yeah... pretty common. Where I spent my weekend, with whom I was, what I ate and what I drank ... everything is out there in open. Earlier the security was controllable, but due to recent timeline changes, many sections are left public. Only a keen observer can make out how to hide your activity feed. Many wont even bother but they are making themselves and their friends more vulnerable to ad agencies and bringing a bigger danger of letting the information go in public domain. It can even hamper somebodies personal life. Oftentimes Facebook over glorifies a person who is high on sharing things. It doesnt necessarily mean the same because you are still seeing the person from the window he/she has opened for you and not in entirety.
2. News Feed that fades away your time. : Constant updates on timeline makes you a spectator than a doer. Sometimes you are on the other side but that doesn’t make you wise either. This itself is the most effective reason to stay away. I tried to control the news feed but it's useless to have a blank news feed. Human mind doesn’t work that way. Once you are there you must get all the updates. No matter how repetitive and irrelevant they are to you. Moreover it's not educating you or letting you form your own opinions. In non FB days people were more inclined to read and focus on what they like, now we keep on reading junk photo messages which may be funny but low in taste(most of them) and non educative. We spend hours reading some "Page Admins" views on status quo and keep on sharing them. This surely degrades our own appetite for learning. Feeding mostly on the comic, satire and sarcasm makes you psychologically unbalanced. You must have noticed, People generally (mostly) use Facebook for celebration of victories, happy stories, achievements, travelogs, purchases, happy life events, meetups or anything that like (seldom we come across heartbroken lovers who keep on sharing sad poetry n songs). This constant dose of happiness is what makes you restless. It asks your subconscious to push harder to stay afloat in this Happy wave. With a little introspection it wont be hard to believe in this fact. Haven't it made you miserable when sometimes you see -your dreams, someone else is achieving?
3. Facebook doesn't care for your privacy. : This is reason enough. Since Facebook's inception, it has changed privacy policies and settings every year, making you more public and thus more vulnerable.The sense of getting spied is getting stronger. Every search of yours every keystroke is monitored, and if I'm guessing it correctly: There's a meta-profile of every individual with Facebook. It probably knows more about you than your closest friends. A online activity cannot be undone, it only propagates leaving more traces. Facebook servers must be full of such traces and they are using it freely to target you. I'm not even touching cookies here. That's a whole different story. Heard of Facebook bug bounty program? Well it doesn't address your genuine concerns over privacy, automated friend requests being sent or allowing any new profile/app to take over your and your friends personal information. The more open your profile is, the more profit they get through advertisements. Why would they pay attention to these loopholes? These are the means of Facebook's earnings.
4. Stops relationship growth. : Yes, it doesn't allow relationships to develop naturally. The moment you add someone... an acquaintance or peer or stranger as friend you get to know all about them... photos, interactions, friends, hangouts, thoughts, past history... that naturally makes you think and start building first impressions, opinions about personality, leaving a very less scope to talk and know the person "in person". Novelty takes a hit, you find nothing new when you meet the person because you have got to know his/her spheres of interest and likes. Does it excite you to know more of person when you already know so much, or does it make you speculate the next moves of the person or helps you plan your next moves? Manipulations... It's works more than different ways subconsciously than it appears on surface. Most of the times the speed at which you post exceeds the speed at which you meet/casually talk with that new person. This makes the other person more aware about your whereabouts without even talking to you and leaves them wondering. This is a new kind of experience coming to fore using social networking. We build relationships through experiences and togetherness. Those experiences are now scattered in two major categories.. one that includes your new friends (you might have added them after having such experience together) and the one that doesn't include your new friends. It's slightly disturbing. The person you barely know is now all over your news feed, and most of the times you may take things in wrong way because you don’t know the person well or the context in which he/she is posting something. It's a troublesome proposition. In other ways it also entices spying behavior, jealousy, constant need of receiving updates and likes for stuff you posted. It unsettles you if it stops, because sharing is caring and if others don't care and pass it off without acknowledging it starts building insensitivity in so called (barely) friendly relationships. This insensitivity might just show up when you actually meet the person (reserved behaviors, as if keeping hidden mental accounts, again it's not superficial but subconscious: you cant pass it off saying it's not true, the environment real or online affects everyone in same way.) This is the case, where the tool takes more importance than the objective itself. By oversimplifying things Facebook actually dumb down everything.
Ok, there are ways to protect your privacy up-to some extent but that makes you manipulative and untrustworthy. In a open society people talk and share with each other. Hiding things from select people (or sharing with few) wont do any good to you in this scenario.
5. Any surprises. : NO we know about everything the moment it happens, on Facebook.
6. Tag me : Ohh yes and get blocked. Why on earth everyone should know about every person I hang out with. Places, people, likes, dislikes, food, clothing, music, movies, books everything is shared to everyone out there. Why ..because we like to and we don’t give a damn about privacy. And even if we do, Facebook keeps updating their privacy policies and uses all the information we provide in numerous ways to benefit them and corporate eyeing for our personal data. It's simple thumb rule "Nothing comes for free in this world."
7. Unwanted friends & followers. : This happens with lucky few (and mostly with beautiful girls). Haven’t you seen hundreds of followers in a profile (thank god if your friend request is accepted). Those are the one's hopelessly waiting to get added. Funny but true. Same goes with friend requests from unknown people, spammers, sponsored ads and promotions. Unwanted Likes? yes that’s also new age problem. Do it never or do it always. Go on a "Liking" spree or stay quite, if you choose to be selective ..wait for the payback or silent treatment.
8. Real-time availability. : The moment you post something on Facebook, you give away knowingly or unknowingly your location details (to Facebook always & sometimes to all) and your availability. You might not be in a mood to start conversation but Some people just wait to message at the same moment and might get offended if you don’t promptly respond. Well isn't it annoying? Moreover you cant pretend that you are sleeping because the update says "It's midnight and I'm preparing Maggi noodles..." real gotcha !
The list can go further because there are deep caveats of human mind and sociopsychological influences at work.
It might turn out to be useful tool if used carefully and with balance. But again human mind is not that helpful, it makes you wander haplessly whenever possible and it's carefree & limitless. Striking right balance is always questionable too, everyone has a different threshold. On other side, Facebook is high on exploiting personal details, interactions. The Observer pattern is turning out to be "Loudspeaker" pattern. Facebook is trying to be everything- Twitter, Flickr, Yahoo IM, Instagram, Blogger, Skype... they all served different purposes without crossing the lines and letting one express freely in that particular space. Facebook invaded those boundaries, by connecting all the dots they destroyed ecosystem. It looks convenient in first glance, but it's treacherous. One monolith giant trying to track all online activities of a person. They can reveal a lot about a person or just provide information for money. Hope it finds sense of privacy and personal space only then I might reconsider to ponder upon it again.
I have seen most of it or should I say used it to the highest possible extent ... but now I don’t want to see more. Call me psycho...whatever. I don't care. For now I'm not returning back.
Nearing the end of this blog, Thank you for being good reader, now the million dollar question...
So how does it feel after deleting, well... ask yourself, how you ever felt before having one.
Reclaim the calm.
-ciao
Friday, September 06, 2013
I sucked at public speaking today.
I don’t know why ??????????
I got no stage fear, I got no chills, I got no butterflies in stomach...still...
This is where my world opens inside out, so I must say I need to work hard on getting it right.
I was Ok in the beginning, but when I looked at the audience in front a sudden feeling of awkwardness crept in.. Do I really know these people, why suddenly they look so unfamiliar to me? Is this feeling pointing to my reserved work relationships... do I need to open up more at workplace on my floor with everyone casually?
It was a sure sign that I'm not feeling comfortable in present setting.
And I must make conscious efforts to set it right.
I got no stage fear, I got no chills, I got no butterflies in stomach...still...
This is where my world opens inside out, so I must say I need to work hard on getting it right.
I was Ok in the beginning, but when I looked at the audience in front a sudden feeling of awkwardness crept in.. Do I really know these people, why suddenly they look so unfamiliar to me? Is this feeling pointing to my reserved work relationships... do I need to open up more at workplace on my floor with everyone casually?
It was a sure sign that I'm not feeling comfortable in present setting.
And I must make conscious efforts to set it right.
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