What would you do with 3.7 billion dollars? Give it to
charity? Buy a really nice car? Personally, I would probably go on the shopping
spree of my life, pay off my college debts, and give most to charity. In 2011, Facebook’s
revenue was at about 3.7 dollars (1). They get so much money just because so many
people choose their website to waste their time with. Luckily, Facebook is not
that bad of a site to waste our time with. At least it does give a good
representation of our identity.
I have chosen Facebook for this essay because I think that
it best represents my social media identity. It is the only social networking
site that I ever use. I have never really gotten the appeal of Twitter,
Pinterest, or Instagram, because Facebook has all the things that those
websites have all in one website. On Facebook, you have the option to post
statuses, upload photos, comment on others’ pictures of statuses, and many
other things. Everything that I post on my Facebook becomes a part of my social
media identity.
I first joined Facebook in December of 2009. This was
halfway through my sophomore year. The only reason I even joined Facebook was because
my friends wanted me to. I didn’t really want one because I didn’t see the need
for one. I was busy all the time and I talked to my friends every day, so why
did I need to network with them? However, I ended up liking Facebook. I, like
most people, got on it nearly every day. I would sit in front of my computer
screen for hours and read status after status. Look at picture after picture.
Until I got bored and probably switched to a different site or went to find
some food since everyone likes to eat when they’re bored. I was surprised that I
didn’t use Facebook the way I thought I would. Most of the time I never posed
anything. Usually all I ever did on Facebook was “Facebook creep”. Facebook
creeping is when you visit your friends’ profiles to see what they are up to.
It allowed me to be up to date on everything. I always knew what couples broke
up and when it happened, the new couples who just got together, who’s birthday
it was, or any other drama that went on. The things that I found on the
profiles of whomever I was creeping would shape my impressions of them.
Although we like to judge others by their Facebook profiles,
there is only so much that they can tell about a person from their Facebook. After
a minute or two on my Facebook, you can learn that my name is Grace Jennings,
my boyfriend is Austin Hinkel, I like the shows House and Glee, my birthday is
September 7th, and I work at subway. If you look a little longer,
you can learn from my pictures that I went to Europe last summer, I am pretty
close with my brother Jake, and who my close high school friends were. Now
after looking at my Facebook, you might think you know me pretty well. But
there are so many things that you won’t find out. Like the fact that I like to
watch soccer games, or that I want to be a dentist, or that I have a fear of
feet. So Facebook does not represent my full identity but it does show some
areas of it.
My current profile picture
With Facebook, there are many ways to show areas of your
identity. I want my Facebook profile to best represent me. To do this, you can
“like” pages of your favorite TV shows, movies, or music. You can show your
political views, your religious views, your sexuality, and so many things. You
can also write in an “about me” section to tell a little about yourself. But I
think the best way to show your identity is through what you post and the
pictures you upload. Posting funny statuses makes you funny. Posting photos of
you and your friends having fun makes you look fun. We base our opinions of people off of these
posts so you want them to best represent you.
One annoying thing about Facebook is that some people not
only use it to represent themselves, but they use it to document every second
of your life. They post stuff that no one really cares about like: “just made
some popcorn” or “put new batteries in my calculator”. These things are bad
representations of a person’s identity. Another annoying aspect of Facebook is
that everyone knows your business. If you post something, then seconds later
everyone knows it. But I guess that’s the entire reason we post stuff isn’t it.
The goal is to get as many “likes” you can get. To get as many comments as possible.
For as many people to see what we post as we can. But it does get annoying
sometimes. For example, if someone has a bad breakup, and everyone sees it on
Facebook, then the next day at school everyone will be talking about it. It
would be awful to be the subject of everyone’s conversations just because of a
Facebook status.
The article “Is Facebook making us lonely?” by Atlantic
magazine, expresses a fear that Facebook is making us lonelier because it
causes us to distance ourselves from everyone else (2). There are over five hundred million Facebook
users. So how could it be making us lonelier when there are so many people to
talk to on the site? In my opinion, I think Facebook makes people lonelier
because they stay online too long rather than going outside to talk to people. This
is also why Facebook is making people more anti-social. We are so used to
talking to people from the safety of behind our computer. It’s so much easier
to say something over the internet rather than to someone’s face. Because of
this it is easier to say things we normally wouldn’t. But when in person,
because we’re so used to hiding behind our technology, it’s harder to
communicate.
So maybe we should start to think about how much time we
waste on Facebook. Think about how much money Facebook Inc. makes just because
of this wasted time. There is so many better ways to spend our time. Why use technology to represent our identity when our physical self is a much better representation.
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