Things in people's Facebook profiles that turn me off.

[Martian Bigfoot]

Well, I just discovered this Facebook thing, and I'm finding it educational. I don't know if this says more about me or the people concerned, but anyway - if your Facebook profile contains the following features, it seems that I now suddenly vehemently dislike you, even though I thought you were a nice person up until now:

- Every single picture of you shows you holding a beer or a cigarette.
- You can't spell.
- The first item listed in your "interests" field is "alcohol".
- About those pictures - apparently you have a skull, heavy metal style, tattooed on your left tit. Wow, I never knew.
- Your favorite movie is "Le Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain".

Heck. Maybe I just need fewer college age girls on my so-called "friends" list. Or maybe I'm just a misanthrope.

[atomicbadgerrace]

Originally Posted by Peak Banana

- The first item listed in your "interests" field is "alcohol".

To be fair-- my interests are alphabetized, because I'm anal like that. So, alcohol ranks pretty high up there, even though it's generally much lower of a priority.

If I may add, these two things have forever irritated me about MySpace and Facebook profiles alike.

1) People whose profile picture is a shirtless shot of their upper body. And the majority of whose pictures are the same.

2) Just because I'm gay, and you're gay, doesn't mean we have to be friends. On MySpace (which I rarely use), I'm more liberal about accepting anyone as a friend. My Facebook friends are pretty much my -real- friends, with some acquaintances. But if your sole reason for adding me is because you found me by searching for men who like men, don't bother.

[ignis_glaciesque]

Originally Posted by atomicbadgerrace

1) People whose profile picture is a shirtless shot of their upper body. And the majority of whose pictures are the same.

Especially when they're posing in the mirror and you can see the camera phone in their hand. So you have both a really crappy-quality picture, and you look like a total idiot. Good job.

[Argent Towers]

The beer-and-frat-parties crowd on Facebook tends to always have the exact same favorite movies list.

Anchorman, Wedding Crashers, Zoolander, Billy Madison, Old School, and Scarface (because being a cocaine-addled psychopath is cool.)

Music: DMB, Jack Johnson, OAR, (some shitty mainstream rapper.)

In the pictures section: every single photo either involves holding a cup of beer, or making a stupid "gang" hand sign because everyone knows that white people making gang hand signs to be ironic is just the funniest thing in the world.

I know it sounds pretentious, and it is, but after looking at hundreds of Facebook profiles, I'm absolutely amazed at how so many people seem to be exactly the same.

[Jamaika a jamaikaiaké]

I find it dull when a favorite movies list is just a list of the most popular movies of the last 2 or 3 years.

[Happy Scrappy Hero Pup]

I suggest the up-and-coming popular facebook group "I thought you were cute... until I read your profile."

You may find those members more like-minded.

[susan]

Thank you. I have been constructing profiles and blogs for a made-up person who is applying for a sensitive job but has exercised no self-control or discretion online. Her self-presentation is heavy on booze, insults, and criticism of her current employer. I have friends and colleagues friending her and posting salacious and drink-focused comments. Her blog consists primarily of comments I've overheard at a campus coffee shop.

I created this persona so that my students, in the role of potential employers or business clients, could search for her online. The lesson is that unless you take steps to preserve your privacy, your second life (broadly construed) may affect your first. The lesson for me is that strangers want to be this person's friend, and frankly, she is an unpleasant specimen.

[Gala Matrix Fire]

Whoa, that sounds neat. And ambitious.

[nocturnal_tick]

Sounds like the very reasons I gave up on it. That and it suddenly became the only way some friends would talk to me. Friends who were within walking distance. Why would I want a questionnaire on your favourite movies when we could just watch a movie at my house?

[hawksgirl]

Add people who list "randomness" under their interests or in their About Me mention how they're "so random" or like "randomness". Recent internet over-use of that word drives me up the wall.

[nikonikosuru]

3 years ago, getting a Facebook was a badge of honor. It was open only to college students. I remember when it finally became available to my college, there was buzz all around during that day. We all used our college e-mails, got our plain facebook account, and we liked it! It just seemed like a small reward for surviving college. Myspace was for everyone; you could always find your non-college friends there. Facebook was the inner circle. Then it became available to every living thing with an e-mail and two brain cells. Then the applications came. It makes me sad to see what Facebook has become. I doubt the creator is losing any sleep (on his big bed made o' money) over it, though.

[Really Not All That Bright]

Originally Posted by nikonikosuru

I doubt the creator is losing any sleep (on his big bed made o' money) over it, though.

$1.5 billion bed o' money.

[Anne Neville]

Originally Posted by susan

Thank you. I have been constructing profiles and blogs for a made-up person who is applying for a sensitive job but has exercised no self-control or discretion online. Her self-presentation is heavy on booze, insults, and criticism of her current employer. I have friends and colleagues friending her and posting salacious and drink-focused comments. Her blog consists primarily of comments I've overheard at a campus coffee shop.

I created this persona so that my students, in the role of potential employers or business clients, could search for her online.

I just want to say that I think this is a terrific idea.

[nikonikosuru]

Originally Posted by Really Not All That Bright

$1.5 billion bed o' money.

Good Lord.

[NinjaChick]

The number one interest in my school's Facebook network is reading. The two most popular books are Anna Karenina and Shakespeare (followed, I might add, by Plato and Euclid).

By contrast, the non-school geographic network I'm in has football and drinking as two of the top interests, and the top book is Harry Potter (followed distantly by two Dan Brown novels)

I don't alway love going to school with a bunch of pretentious geeks, but it sure as hell beats the alternative.

[Giles]

Originally Posted by Peak Banana

- Your favorite movie is "Le Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain".

[Quickly checks Facebook profile, and finds the dreadful "'Amélie" there.]
Well, I'll just have to cope with having turned Peak Banana off.

[Santo Rugger]

Originally Posted by nikonikosuru

3 years ago, getting a Facebook was a badge of honor. It was open only to college students. I remember when it finally became available to my college, there was buzz all around during that day. We all used our college e-mails, got our plain facebook account, and we liked it! It just seemed like a small reward for surviving college. Myspace was for everyone; you could always find your non-college friends there. Facebook was the inner circle. Then it became available to every living thing with an e-mail and two brain cells. Then the applications came. It makes me sad to see what Facebook has become. I doubt the creator is losing any sleep (on his big bed made o' money) over it, though.

Seconded.

[Maastricht]

What's wrong with "Amelie"? It's a nice movie and I'm baffled it would be popular with the alcohol and skull-tattoo crowd.

[Martian Bigfoot]

Originally Posted by Maastricht

What's wrong with "Amelie"? It's a nice movie and I'm baffled it would be popular with the alcohol and skull-tattoo crowd.

I dunno, maybe it's a local thing around these parts. It's not the darned movie's fault, I suppose, it's a perfectly decent movie, it didn't mean any harm, I'm sure. However, it's the movie of choice around here for 20-something year old girls who want to come off as having "taste", while the fact is they they've never seen a really good movie in their lives, and probably wouldn't recognize one if it hit them smack in the tit. They go all gaga over it, in fact. "-Do you like movies? -Yeah! Have you seen Amelie? Oh, it's sooo great!" I just wish they would shut the heck up about it already.

The worst part is that Jeunet did actually make one really good movie once: Delicatessen. But has any of them seen that? Of course not.

[Kyla]

Originally Posted by Maastricht

What's wrong with "Amelie"? It's a nice movie and I'm baffled it would be popular with the alcohol and skull-tattoo crowd.

I think that the OP's problem was with the inclusion of the entire title in French, which sounds kind of pretentious.

Personally, I love Amelie. It's a very sweet movie.

ETA: Never mind, after the OP's clarification, it's clear he doesn't have any problems with pretentiousness.

[Martian Bigfoot]

Originally Posted by Kyla

I think that the OP's problem was with the inclusion of the entire title in French, which sounds kind of pretentious.

Uh, no, that was just me being pretentious, I suppose. Nono, they call it Amelie. They're all on first-name basis with the thing.

[Kyla]

Originally Posted by Peak Banana

Uh, no, that was just me being pretentious, I suppose. Nono, they call it Amelie. They're all on first-name basis with the thing.

That's the name on the front of my DVD box. I didn't realize I was being gauche by referring to the movie by the title on the DVD box.

[Giles]

Originally Posted by Peak Banana

I dunno, maybe it's a local thing around these parts. It's not the darned movie's fault, I suppose, it's a perfectly decent movie, it didn't mean any harm, I'm sure. However, it's the movie of choice around here for 20-something year old girls who want to come off as having "taste" ...

So, I'm 40 years wide of that age range, and the wrong gender: what does that say about my choice in movies? Really, do our favourite movies have to be among the 20 or so "greatest movies ever made"? Or can they just be movies that we enjoy watching several times for relaxation?

[Martian Bigfoot]

Originally Posted by Kyla

That's the name on the front of my DVD box. I didn't realize I was being gauche by referring to the movie by the title on the DVD box.

You're not! I call it that too! It's its name! I just wrote the damned name in French in the OP to be as clear as possible and avoid ambiguity!

Oh, c*ck it. I think I'll go start another thread titled "Have you ever started a thread about Facebook profiles because you were crancy about something entirely unrelated and needed to blow some steam, got embroiled in a debate over the artistic value of some French movie, and ended up coming off as a pretentious tw*t?"

Peak "I didn't really want to talk about French movies anyway, and for the record I find Audrey Tautou as hot as the next guy does" Banana.

[Giles]

Originally Posted by Peak Banana

Oh, c*ck it. I think I'll go start another thread titled "Have you ever started a thread about Facebook profiles because you were crancy about something entirely unrelated and needed to blow some steam, got embroiled in a debate over the artistic value of some French movie, and ended up coming off as a pretentious tw*t?"

Well, the thing about Facebook (at least for us few oldies that are in there) is that you can relax a bit, and not just talk about *really* *serious* subjects. And another thing is that we don't all have to have the same tastes. Though I'm very tempted to go off and set up a Facebook group called "Les amateurs d'Amélie Poulain", just to spite you and the other Amélie haters

[Lizard]

You know what turns me off? Facebook.