OK, I don’t spend enough time on there to download or learn all the “secret” applications and all. But as a 45 year old male, I have little interest in posting special messages to “Funwalls” or sending “Dark Beers” to people, or … well just about anything really.
I connected with a couple of people from my high-school days originally, but the rest of the crap I receive through the application is just that…crap.
comments?
Well, at least people list their location.
As a 44-year old male, I find it interesting, I’m exploring it right now as a social networking site. If you aren’t interested in social networking then you probably won’t be interested in Facebook. What were you expecting from it?
Some of the applications are fun and useful, but only if you want to share stuff with others. I’ll probably never use it as much as my 16-year old niece, but I log in roughly once a day or so.
I have no interest in the applications and I’m 24. All I’ve got is groups, events and photos. I’ve deleted/ignored the rest.
I still love using Facebook. Sometimes after highschool ends, you lose track of people that wish that you didn’t. I’ve rekindled a couple of friendships through Facebook that I wouldn’t have otherwise.
Many of the applications do indeed suck. (And they’re not developed by Facebook itself; FB just provides the interface.) As a social networking site, its usefulness is directly proportional to the number of people you know who actually use it. At college, it’s pretty much indispensable; if you don’t know many people on it, it’s not really useful.
I much preferred Facebook before they added all these silly applications. It was everything MySpace wasn’t… no videos, no flashing “Princess” graphics, just a simple layout with some relevant info about the person. Now it just seems like a way to spam your friends (or should I say “friends”) with stupid irrelevant crap.
I have to admit, though, Facebook has been good to me. It allowed me to reconnect with some old friends I’d lost touch with during a rough period in my life where I did some stupid and regrettable things, and has allowed me to keep some semblance of a social life during the insanity that has been the last six months at work. To me, that alone is worth the price of a hundred annoying FunWall postings in and of itself.
(I’m 29, for what it’s worth)
Facebook was a part of life during grad school. This was before those stupid flashy applications. Post-grad school, it has helped a lot of us keep in touch. I have to say I vastly preferred it before it tried to turn itself into Myspace, but now that I’ve graduated I don’t check it several times a day, so … :: shrug ::
Let me just clarify here (OP checking in) that I am absolutely clueless as to what to do in the damned thing! And, since I’m obviously a dinosaur, I have no ambition to learn. And, on top of that, I’m not really an exhibitionist, which seems to me what these things are all about anyway? No?
I’m sorry I signed up, and now if I leave I’m afraid I might hurt the feelings of those with whom I’ve regained contact. Aye carrumba!
I ignore almost all of the requests to add apps.
Well, you don’t really have to do anything with it. You can just leave it alone and if one of your newly connected friends wants to contact you, they can send you a message and Facebook will notify you by email. Post a pic and it’s possible other old friends may eventually find you.
Honestly, if you’re over 25, it can be tough to find peers using it as it evolved from a program exclusively for college kids. But more and more people are beginning to use it and I’ve reconnected with several friends I wouldn’t have otherwise.
Edited to add: yes, just ignore all the silly “vampire bites”, etc. apps. Some people enjoy them but no one will get there feelings hurt if you don’t play the games. I just use it for messaging and to get updates on my friends.
I’m pretty much in the same position - I joined purely because an old friend who lives hundreds of miles away asked me to, and assumed it would just be emails with bells on, maybe a way for people to show off about their great success/babies since university and such. But every now and again I get a virtual whisky sent through, or something is posted on some ‘funwall’ or something and as soon as I login I have to leave immediately, cringing. It makes me feel like an old man thrown into some hellish virtual youth club, and I’m only 31. With the added disadvantage that now I have a presence on there, it’s like I’m *actively avoiding * old friends, rather than just cheerfully neglecting them as I always had done previously.
Funny enough, I keep a myspace page for keeping up with my daughter and her friends, but have managed to reconnect with some people (including most recently my favourite cousin!) on it. I don’t remember who it was that insisted I get a Facebook “because that’s where the adults hang out and there’s less of the juvenile shit that you find on Myspace” but I only check my Facebook about once in a blue moon – if that. It seems that the 4 or 5 people on there are more into the “juvenile shit” than the teenagers on my friend list on Myspace. I don’t know, personally, I wasn’t impressed.
I have a list of about 60-odd “requests” at the top right of my Facebook that I haven’t even bothered to reject… not friend adds, just crap like virtual snowballs or fish tanks or graffiti walls or some kind of lame “Hot or Not” rip-off. Honestly.
On the plus side, I have got in touch with a few people I hadn’t heard from for years. But really, once you’re on it, you don’t need to go on it much, as you get email notifications if anyone sends you a message, right?
I’m 30, and was “social networking” on old BBSes (telnet mono.city.ac.uk, anyone?) before the term existed…
I used facebook for a while, added up to 45 friends (including a couple of people I’d lost touch with which was quite nifty) but I’ve deactivated my account now as I don’t use it. I’m 29 and see it as something for people in Uni, personally I don’t get much of the fun of it. I’m all for social networking, but for a lot of people that seems to mean listing people as a friend when they don’t know them well or (indeed) haven’t even met them.
Not only that, but for most of the apps, you can click to add them and the next screen has a little link in the lower right that will block the app. Tired of getting vampire requests? Block Vampire App. Tired of getting drinks sent to you? Block Top Friends App.
I find it useful for keeping track of what people are up to in general, but these days I’m rather bored of poking people, sending ‘drinks’ and messing with the apps in general. Plus many of the applications result in a lot of email spam. I hardly use anything besides the wall now, and I can’t be bothered to check it more often than once every few days.
As if sensing my waning enthusiasm for it, Facebook sent me five emails notifying me of the same thing shortly after I posted that.
Well, you’re doing better than me, chocolatefrog, Facebook likes to not notify me of things at all, or to notify me only several days after I’ve already found them and acted on them.
I play a lot of Scrabble on Facebook, or I would probably visit it rarely. I’ve reconnected with people from High School and Brazil, though, which is nice.
The not nice thing is that Facebook is apparently the new home of Fax Lore. First it was faxes, then it moved to email, and then we all drilled into our friends heads that they weren’t allowed to forward us Jesus crap and stories about dying little girls in email. So now it’s moved to Facebook.
God damn apps. People say Facebook is classier than Myspace, but at least I don’t get bitten by goddamn vampires every day on Myspace.
I’ve blocked the more annoying applications (Vampires and its spawn). It was a lot better before Myspaceification and the stupid third-party apps. But yeah, if you don’t have a lot of RL friends who use Facebook or plan to seek out more friends on the service it’s pretty useless.