Facebook has become a necessity and practically everyone in the modern world is on facebook. It isn't a casual move but has become a symbol of being 'cool' and modern. Facebook is no longer a tool for communication but has become a platform where people can portray to the entire world, what they are or what they 'intend' to be.
For example, people having many friends on facebook are thought as being highly social and that they would make a good friend to you and then you add them as well. But who knows whether such people know everyone on their facebook friend list or have they randomly added people to increase their friend list? On the other hand, people who do not have good profile pictures and have less friends on facebook are thought to be reserved and backward. Isn't facebook really deceptive? How can you judge a person by looking at their profiles?
For example, people having many friends on facebook are thought as being highly social and that they would make a good friend to you and then you add them as well. But who knows whether such people know everyone on their facebook friend list or have they randomly added people to increase their friend list? On the other hand, people who do not have good profile pictures and have less friends on facebook are thought to be reserved and backward. Isn't facebook really deceptive? How can you judge a person by looking at their profiles?
Newspaper reports also mention that too many employers these days stalk their employees on facebook, gather their personal information and fire them from their job the very next day. Click here for the article. This, however, is a bad tool to judge an individual's style of working or behavior because who knows whether or not are you a part of their open profile or their 'limited profile'? Basing judgements on partial truth or many a times on just a 'portrayed image' may deprive the deserving candidate from a good job experience. Too many workers have lost their jobs because of such stalking being done by employees.
People should remember that one should not judge a book by its cover as what may seem to be the truth may not actually be the truth. Befriending random people by looking at there attractive profiles can prove to be extremely unsafe since such people are very quick at hacking passwards and messing up with your profile. An attractive profile, good pictures and certainly many mutual friends are not a guarantee of you knowing that person. Its better to be non judgemental than juding people through such social networking sites, both for personal and professional use.
I think it might be an over-generalization to say that people think of those with many Facebook friends as highly social and therefore add-able. It would have to depend on the individual. Similarly with people with unattractive photos- exactly who believes these people are "reserved" and "backwards"? If people are only adding their genuine friends- as opposed to people who have stunning photos and an impressive friend collection and hacker inclinations- they shouldn't encounter this problem.
ReplyDeleteI don't understand why people find it so hard to work out, from a photo and a name, if they actually know someone in real life or not. Perhaps people need to become a little more privacy-savvy. I've heard some pretty bad stories about unwanted profile viewing (usually done by parents...) leading to embarassment for various Facebook users. Come on guys, privatise!