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I have 52 FB friends, over 40 of them live in the US/Canada, and I've actually met around 45 of those 52. I only have one co-worker as a FB friend, as I try to keep my work and social lives separate.
I ignore online friend requests from complete strangers, but have added a couple from people who are in the same FB groups as me, who come cross as being genuine and interesting. Never have an online friend that you wouldn't want to meet in real life.
I have a group of friends I've known online for about 14 years. We used to have a forum when forums were popular, and now we have a secret FB group instead. It's a small group that we never add to. I consider them friends even though we've never met in person. I know the names of their husbands, kids, pets, the things they've worried about and the things they've been excited about, who's had cancer, who's gotten divorced and why, etc.
Way way back in the Oprah Winfry forum days of 1996 I clicked on a forum for women of the South or something like that. I think there were 10 of us that posted and got to know each other on line. We had to keep changing to different forums as forums closed. When Oprah closed we found others until Face Book. Several dropped out; but there are still 5 of us on a closed Face Book page. We feel like we know each other's families more than we know our own distant relatives. We have seen our kids reach puberty, graduate from high school and college, get married and have kids. We have been there on line for divorces and marriages, deaths in the families, for catastrophes like hurricanes, for all the joys and sorrows. They are my friends just as much as my high school and college friends I talk to on FB are still my friends or the friends I have where I live.
Do I have a friends list of thousands.....no way. Are there business associates on my FB list. *ell no. Are there unknown people who tag me to be friends. No way. I am very selective. I use FB mostly to stay in touch and see pictures of family that live across the country from me. I have a private family only page. I have a high school class page just for high school friends. And I have my private group of 5 southern friends on line page. I select my friends. I select how much they see. I make sure my pages are secure. I also don't do aps on FB which allows them to share with the world. I would not want to do that to my friends.
I call them FB friends. I had a funny experience yesterday...I live in a very small town and there is a lady whose posts make me laugh we have mutual friends. I met her in person and I felt like I knew her!!!! Needless to say we hugged and I friended her.
So, I had a conversation today with somebody and we brought up the subject of a relatively obscure band.
And I was like, "Oh, I have a friend who loves that band. They see them tour every time they come through this area. They're like crazy about them."
In reality, my 'friend' is a Facebook friend that I know from high school that I haven't talked to since then and really didn't talk to that much when we were in high school. And I know they follow the band because they post on Facebook quite a bit and blast posts about how much they love the band and see them everytime they come through.
I don't really consider that person a 'friend'. But it just popped into my head. And I just referred to that person that way. But it felt a little odd.
But it's odd. In the year 2018, sometimes you know more about what's going on in the life of your Facebook friends than your regular friends? And we all know there's people who post so often, you know everything that is going on in their life including the intimate details of their love life, even though that person might not even remember your name if they see you if you barely post yourself.
Do you guys refer to your Facebook friends as your friends? Sometimes I refer to such people as my 'Facebook friend'. Lol.
ROFL, I have found myself saying, "A friend of mine..." and it's someone on City-Data.
I do have some people I've never met in RL that I only know online. Back in 2002, I stumbled across a message board on AOL and became one of the regulars on that board. A core group kept in touch when the AOL boards shut down, first setting up our own little community on another forum and eventually moving to Facebook. Three of the group have died, but the rest of us have kept in touch while our kids grew up, grandchildren were born, parents, and in one case a spouse, passed away, we retired, started a new business, fell in love. I have met two of them in real life, and I hope to meet another one sometime soon, but the ones in California and Washington State I may never get to meet. I still consider them friends.
So, I had a conversation today with somebody and we brought up the subject of a relatively obscure band.
And I was like, "Oh, I have a friend who loves that band. They see them tour every time they come through this area. They're like crazy about them."
In reality, my 'friend' is a Facebook friend that I know from high school that I haven't talked to since then and really didn't talk to that much when we were in high school. And I know they follow the band because they post on Facebook quite a bit and blast posts about how much they love the band and see them everytime they come through.
I don't really consider that person a 'friend'. But it just popped into my head. And I just referred to that person that way. But it felt a little odd.
But it's odd. In the year 2018, sometimes you know more about what's going on in the life of your Facebook friends than your regular friends? And we all know there's people who post so often, you know everything that is going on in their life including the intimate details of their love life, even though that person might not even remember your name if they see you if you barely post yourself.
Do you guys refer to your Facebook friends as your friends? Sometimes I refer to such people as my 'Facebook friend'. Lol.
I do. I have 3 or 4 Facebook friends that I've never met in person. One of them, I knew from a forum I used to frequent, where we all seemed to gel into good friendships, and so it carried over to Facebook. We laugh, we have 'inside' jokes, we share stuff we know the other will like.
Another, we actually became friends through the facebook game Farmtown. LOL I liked her garden and told her so. LOL We started talking, and she gave me a friend request, which I accepted. We'll probably never meet, but she's invited me to her home if I'm ever in Texas. She's an admirable person, and has an interesting (to me) life, and we seem to be, on a spiritual level, simpatico. I feel like if we met in person, it wouldn't be awkward. It'd just be like old friends meeting up.
Another one, he owns property the same place my husband and I own property. The development has its own Facebook Group page. One time, I was trying to post a picture, and couldn't figure out why it wouldn't post to the page. He offered to help, but I had to friend him in order for him to help me. He's a nice average guy who's never been innapropriate, and we laugh at each other's jokes, like each other's pictures, etc. I am content to keep him as a Facebook friend, and who knows, since we both have lots out in that development, I may actually meet him in person sometime.
I might be 'looser' with the term 'friend' than a lot of people...but I'm fairly open hearted about the concept. Everyone has the potential to be my friend until they show me otherwise. (Shrugging my shoulders.)
So, I had a conversation today with somebody and we brought up the subject of a relatively obscure band.
And I was like, "Oh, I have a friend who loves that band. They see them tour every time they come through this area. They're like crazy about them."
In reality, my 'friend' is a Facebook friend that I know from high school that I haven't talked to since then and really didn't talk to that much when we were in high school. And I know they follow the band because they post on Facebook quite a bit and blast posts about how much they love the band and see them everytime they come through.
I don't really consider that person a 'friend'. But it just popped into my head. And I just referred to that person that way. But it felt a little odd.
But it's odd. In the year 2018, sometimes you know more about what's going on in the life of your Facebook friends than your regular friends? And we all know there's people who post so often, you know everything that is going on in their life including the intimate details of their love life, even though that person might not even remember your name if they see you if you barely post yourself.
Do you guys refer to your Facebook friends as your friends? Sometimes I refer to such people as my 'Facebook friend'. Lol.
Is it me? Is it GWAR?
Just playin'. But seriously I am that person, for some people, though...little less in recent years, but...
I do use the word "friends" loosely sometimes. If I'm talking about one particular person and I don't REALLY have a friendship with them, I'll qualify it as a "Facebook friend." It's not that I add random strangers as some might think who only friend people they're close to in real life... I do need SOME reason to let that connection happen. I have had requests from weird people with whom I cannot see a single thing I've got in common and I just wonder what they are about...and I suspect they might be scammers, so I delete their requests.
Most of my friends on Facebook have something to do with the band, GWAR. Some are from a local social organization/community I'm part of. Others I met at events related to that, and decided I wanted to stay in touch. A few are family, a few are coworkers or former coworkers or people I knew from high school and got curious about. Another few are people whose work (such as art, music, writing, crafting/design, performance, etc) I admire, so I want to follow what they are up to...never know when I might want to buy something from them or support their endeavors. Some are even former lovers, who were worth staying in touch with. A more accurate way of framing it, than calling them all "friends" would be, "an extrovert's social network."
But I have gotten rid of some who annoy me. Rants and arguments, racism or bigotry, constantly trying to sell me something I don't want to buy, religious propaganda...those are all reasons I'll unfriend or unfollow someone. I'm mostly there for laughs. Some posts I refer to as "Facebook funnies." I also like cute animals and cool photography, that kind of thing.
A while ago, I purged about 50% of my connections on Facebook-- those of the "friends-of-friends," former classmates, and people I met one time variety. My Facebook network now consists almost exclusively of true friends and family, because my loved ones don't start arguments on my page, or insult my politics. A bare handful are acquaintances with whom I would like to remain in touch, for one reason or another. Also, my personal policy has always been to have zero work colleagues as Facebook connections, because people like to gossip at work about what coworkers post. When someone I work with asks me to connect on FB, I tell them that I only use my account with family. It's true enough.
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And we all know there's people who post so often, you know everything that is going on in their life including the intimate details of their love life, even though that person might not even remember your name if they see you if you barely post yourself.
