I have written a couple of blogs recently and also Twittered about my most recent technological addiction, Facebook. A reply to one of these posts by Cammie Bean and Sue Waters asked me what the attraction to this was. I decided that while I was away I ought to give some considered thought to this question this and why I find this application so addictive.
In the beginning…
Let me start at the beginning, because, frankly, in the beginning there was no love affair.
Several months ago [if memory serves, around March or so] Sue Waters asked me to start a Facebook account with her. I was somewhat obsessed with my iPod at the time, and got as far as setting up the account, and not much more than that.
Several months latter, there was a significant amount of Twittering from the afore mentioned Sue about her playing scrabble with Harriet Wakelam on Facebook. Again, not overly concerned at this point as I was in the middle of 100 h weeks at work on top of studying at Uni.
Starting to bite…[sorry for the shark analogy!]…a networked flood
Facebook did not really enter my life with any real impact until approximately 3 weeks ago. A colleague at work mentioned she was using Facebook, and I mentioned I had an account. She added me as a friend (after much searching – as I could not remember my account details, which incidentally turned out to be my name!). Fine, I went in and accepted. Coincidentally about 3 days later a former team mate from water polo added me. Ok, now the curiosity was spiking. I went in, added my former team mate and looked at their Facebook account and went ‘wow, look at all these people that are my friends I know here!’ I added as many as I could find………in the space of the next 24 h, I was networked to about 30 of my friends across the world, some of which I have not seen for over 10 years.
The activity…
The more friends I contacted, the more contacts back I received. Then I started getting beer……seriously, although it WAS virtual! I became a Ninja in the war against Pirates; a jedi in the fight of good against the evil Sith; took movie quizzes, asked questions for my friends to answer, put up photos and tagged my friends in them, which then shows up in THEIR accounts; added a fun wall for people to write on, send me comments, dialogue with. I update my status regularly – ie the standard starts “Sue Hickton is” I then add a statement such as “…happy the Eagles beat St Kilda tonight” or “is offline for the week shark diving”. People seem to randomly update their statuses at all hours of the day. I have even inserted my Flickr 
stream and Twitter into my account so I don’t miss anything. In an effort to get more readers to my blog, have added a feed straight from my blog into my Facebook account. Oh I have also a) joined groups such as an Eagles supporters group and b) created groups such as Dolphin’s Water Polo Club for all my club mates.
Impact of the addiction…
Here are some examples of the impact this application is having on lives of myself and my friends:
1) In Melbourne at my friends house, the 3 of us sat in the lounge room, and had a laptop each – we simultaneously [yes even a male!] watched tv, chatted randomly and played with our Facebook via the wireless network. Ironically, while geographically located in a 2m radius of each other, were also communicating through Facebook with each other.
2) Another friend, went out on a bender Saturday night – he woke up hungover and grumpy Sunday morning. Upon waking, did he a) go to the loo? b) have a shower? c) have some disprin or d) get on Facebook for 2 hours? The correct answer is d). He proceeded to advise his friends via an addin, of every single city in the world he had visited. It took him 2 h before he realised he should be dressed and sorted to go to the zoo with us.
3) Two colleagues at work have Facebook up all the time. No, none of those horror stories of half a day everyday Facebooking, but a quick check now and then, maybe a status update or reply to a message.
4) Myself, at the Adelaide airport on Monday in a 4 hour layover between flights, discovered the joys of Facebook on my mobile phone. In fact, I updated my status, added some friends, wrote some messages and looked at some photos.
That was just a quick smattering.
Before I left my internet connection behind I have posted a question in my Facebook and invited my friends to give 3 reasons as to what it is in particular that they like about Facebook [if they have answered this one, will add response samples when I return, into this post for you].
Here we go! Grabbed some feedback from the airport in Adelaide for you as promised:
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On the boat, totally not an empirical survey!
My friends in Melbourne didn’t really want to be interviewed per say…so thought I would stalk random strangers on the shark boat. Our resident dive master and videographer Jen has moved to Australia from Scotland, so I have lined her up as my first victim. She doesn’t appear to have caught the Facebook bug (YET)…unusual…here are her thoughts.
Jaye has another perspective with different issues. You can listen to her views on Facebook here
Facebook in the Workplace
One person on the dive boat who works at an accounting firm in Sydney said that the internet in his workplace was already blocked from using Facebook (much to his disgust he says – he goes home and jumps straight online). A friend who works at a government department in Perth, Western Australia says that his department has already blocked the use of MSN, Skype and a variety of other instant messengers. Gmail and Facebook are apparently the next to go. One would hope that this situation will not be allowed to occur by places of learning such as TAFE’s, Universities or Schools, as educators need to be able to experiment and explore the technological framework that surrounds us to expand and improve learning. [Note: got in off plane last night, and there was a late night news program on, and it was discussing the impact of Facebook in the workplace. Comment was of a wide variety].
Navel Gazing on own Facebook addiction
Since I have asked my friends and colleagues to discuss their interest/use/obsession with Facebook, I thought I should search closer to home. I think initially it was the large adrenaline rush of the first 48 hours with the network of friends bursting into my Facebook life and the excitement of the new tools and add-ins that allowed me to interact with my friends in silly ways. This phenomena is not unusual for me with new software/applications/programs and so forth.
After the best part of a week without access to it and in light of giving all around me the third degree, I have started to think that what I really value is the ability to link to friends old and new all over the world, and actually to know what is going on in their lives and share with them mine. It’s always a surprise when I log in – you never know who will have found you next.
When one reflects upon the vast array and network of one’s friends, it is apparent that they cannot possibly be aware of the sheer variety of interests and personal foibles that makes you you. For example, a large number of the people that I am friends with in Facebook have no clue that a) I blog or b) love underwater photography or c) am a total geek [though some may argue they suspect with the latter!]. Facebook allows me to feed my blog posts and Flickr stream into it (as I mentioned above), but in many respects, what I am in fact doing, is sharing other parts of myself with my wider circle of friends and giving them the opportunity to know other sides to me.
My Facebook future
Currently, the main purpose of my use of Facebook is for the social networking aspect. However as my collective friends group increases to include peers and colleagues, I potentially see a greater use which is that of bringing together in a slightly more formal context ones colleagues and peers. I might set up one for the 2003 Flexible Learning Leaders and see dangle it out there to see what happens. Regardless, in my life, as long as my friends are using Facebook to interact, communicate and stay in touch, so will I.
