1463: Losing Face

I’ve been off Facebook for some time now — a cursory search through these pages suggests I closed my account in October of last year — and for the most part I haven’t missed it.

I certainly haven’t missed the endlessly inane reshares of content from George Takei(‘s PR intern) which in turn was stuff that already did the rounds on Reddit and subsequently Twitter several days earlier.

I also haven’t missed the few people who seem to think that Facebook is an appropriate platform for standing atop their soapbox and bellowing the most ill-informed political and/or sociological opinions they can possibly think of.

I also haven’t missed having shit games and advertising jammed forcibly down my throat every time I log in. I spent a considerable amount of time reviewing Facebook games professionally and all it left me with was a bitterly passionate desire to never play one ever again.

And yet…

Over the weekend I went out. This is nothing unusual in itself, but this was something of a special occasion — it was a reunion of sorts for those of us who studied music at the University of Southampton between 1999 and 2002. We were a pretty close-knit bunch while we were there — though I must confess, being a joint-honours English and Music student, that I always felt somewhat on the periphery of this particular social group — and most people have kept in touch pretty well ever since. A number of us are still in Southampton, too, though a distressingly small number of us are actually doing anything with our music studies professionally. (Note to kids planning their future: when someone tells you that a particular degree is a “good, general choice that will get you into most careers,” they are talking bollocks.)

Anyway, yeah. We went out to a pub near Newbury and ate our respective body weights in roast dinners and custard-covered desserts. It was thoroughly pleasant, particularly as I hadn’t seen some of these people for a while.

It’s partly my fault, of course — I could have very easily picked up the phone and invited them over for dinner, or coffee, or whatever, but I haven’t. But then they haven’t either. I don’t say this with bitterness — it’s just the way that the rapid pace of modern 21st century life makes people think. Real-life friendships often fall by the wayside somewhat, and people whom you once spent every day with become people that you see a couple of times a year — albeit on those occasions, you’ll start singing improvised offensive German barbershop a cappella as if no time whatsoever had passed between the last couple of times you saw one another. (At least you will if you are me and my friends.)

The thing is, though, for many people, Facebook fills that gap between in-person interactions — or “face time” as obnoxious wankers like to call it. It allows you to remind each other of your existence, and to likewise acknowledge one another’s existence with a Like or a Comment.

At least, that’s the intention. One might argue that said intention has been somewhat diluted over the last few years as Facebook has become less and less about meaningful social interactions and more and more about sharing viral content in an attempt to amass as many Likes, comments and shares as possible.

Having almost missed out on this reunion due to my non-presence on Facebook, I find myself questioning my decision to leave the network. It also makes me ponder whether or not it might be possible to use it in a different way — specifically, to have a substantial cull of my friends list to just those who are local and whom I am likely to want to see again at some point. I’d cut out any Pages that I was following — not that I think I was following many in the first place — and keep my friends list down in the double-digits if at all possible. I’d be ruthless in the culling of people who didn’t post anything interesting or useful and consequently cluttered up my news feed with bullshit, and I’d lock down my account so I’d be in complete control of who could find me. I’d also minimise overlap between Facebook and Twitter, because what’s the point?

I’m tempted to try this, though with all the changes I’ve seen Facebook make regarding how it decides what it wants to show to you, I have my doubts as to how useful the service is even with these attempts to take ownership of the experience. It certainly can’t hurt to give it a go, anyway, and if it does turn out to be useless nonsense as I suspect, it’s little bother to simply hit the “deactivate” button again.

I’ll leave you with this, which is a big part of my hesitance to return: