Tag Archives: Facebook

Derek Hanke, Features, Keevin Sakai

Social media challenge accepted

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By Derek Hanke

Social media has taken a dominant position in our society today. Websites such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are used frequently by a large percentage of the youth population.

This has led some individuals to become dependent on them, almost to the point where going without them would be unthinkable.

In order to test the theory that social media can be addictive, two students were given the challenge of going a weekend without them.

Both freshman Rachel Lamb and senior Parker Hale underwent the social media challenge. Lamb initially felt that this task would be an easy one.

Before the Challenge

“Going without Facebook and Twitter won’t impact my life but I’ll probably have to delete the apps of my phone so I don’t use them,” said Lamb.

Hale said that others will not be impacted by the challenge.

“I don’t think my followers will notice my absence,” said Hale.

Both Lamb and Hale think they will be able to go a weekend without social media, although they admit social media plays a large part in their lives.

“Everyone has a Facebook. And, when I get on Twitter, it’s normally so I can have something interesting to do,” said Lamb.

“Social media gives me something to do when I’m bored and keeps me informed about what’s going on,” said Hale.

After the Challenge

Throughout the weekend, Lamb was able to go without social media while Hale was not.

“I forgot about the challenge multiple times over the weekend,” said Hale.

He blamed this lapse of memory on his familiarity with the routine of getting on social media.

“I didn’t really feel the need to get on Twitter or Instagram, I just got on there out of habit,” he said.

Hale says the weekend helped remind him of the frequency he uses social media and its importance to him.

“I get on social media quite a lot. Without it, I felt less informed because I didn’t know what was going on all the time,” said Hale.

Hale refutes the claim that social media is an important part of his life.

“It’s not that it’s an important part of my life; I could definitely go without social media, but it’s something to keep me busy when I’m bored,” he said.

Hale found there was an unexpected benefit to going without social media.

“By not getting on twitter and instagram, doing homework was ten times easier,” Hale said.

Lamb came to better understand the role social media plays in her life.

“This weekend made me realize that Facebook isn’t as important to me as I thought it was,” she said.

Even after this realization, Lamb still felt something was missing.

“I felt less informed that usual; if something went on, I wouldn’t know about it because everyone puts everything on Facebook,” said Lamb.

Lamb reports that she was more social without social media.

“Without Twitter and Facebook, I actually spent more time talking to people,” she said.

While certain individuals are more inclined to use social media than others out of habit, this process can actually hinder the socialization process by making one rely it to socialize instead of direct communication.

Features

Facebook stalking still worries students

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By Gwen P. Galeza and Jared Murray

Going through all of your status updates and looking through all of your pictures is not just for crazy relatives anymore. With people’s personal information just a click away, many people take this casual hobby too far, wasting hours on other’s profiles. The idea of getting to know someone without actually talking appeals to this generation’s socially awkward teenage population.

The thought of one’s pictures, statuses and information being readily available to complete strangers does not unnerve as many FC students as one would think.

Many FC students are taking advantage of some of the more lax security settings on the peoples profiles, whether to just waste time or mock.

“When you talk about it at school like you go ‘I saw that on Facebook’ then that’s when it becomes weird,” said junior Stephen Schraffenberger.

Even when students are confronted with the realization of being stalked, some do not bother changing their security settings.

“If I knew the person stalking me I wouldn’t change my settings, but if it was some creepy guy I definitely would,” said senior Holly Cobb.

Despite having various views on Facebook stalking itself, the students interviewed generally agreed on when Facebook stalking becomes too far.

Sophomore Savannah O’Brien said that when they start “liking” all your picures, commenting on a wall post, a status and messaging you that’s when it goes too far.

For those who are frightened by the thought of unfamiliar persons being able to stalk you for their own viewing pleasure, Facebook does offer security options to make you invisible to other Facebook users.

“If I knew someone was stalking [me] I’d probably log off and never get back on again,” said senior Nicollette Westbay.

Claire DeFrancisci, Columns, Forum

‘Truth is…’ becomes internet cliche

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By Claire DeFrancisci

By Summer Haynes

Most teenagers that have a  Facebook have seen them. Many of those teenagers have posted them. The “truth is” statuses have invaded Facebook and now are essentially unavoidable.

 A “truth is” status is when a user posts “truth is” as their status and their friends can “like” it. As the status-poster sees someone has liked it they basically write memories and what they have always thought of this person on the person’s wall. This may not seem  obnoxious but don’t be fooled. When these build up in someone’s Facebook newsfeed it’s like reading the same monotonous posts over and over.

 These contagious posts come in many different forms. The “let’s be honest”, “3 facts”, and “rate you 1-10” are practically the same thing. My personal favorite is the “put a number and a question in my inbox and I’ll answer it as my status” post.  It is the exact same thing as simply asking someone a question (typically about how attractive someone thinks they are) and having him or her answer. These are worse because no one can see what the question was, only the answer.

 Reading this mindless Facebook graffiti is exhausting due to the fact that most of them are exactly the same thing. A typical answer goes like this:

 Truth is: I’ve seen you in the hallway a couple times.

Truth is: You’re so pretty!

Truth is: You seem chill.

Truth is: We should totally hang out sometime!

Although these posts can be annoying and repetitive, it is understandable why they are so popular. Who would not want to know what somebody thinks of you right? Unfortunately you are not getting the truth most of the time, it is mostly mindless and complimentary.

 My advice is instead of writing a short impersonal note on someone’s virtual wall, find the courage to come up and talk to him or her in person.

Columns, Forum

Columnist criticizes Facebook

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By Meghan Poff

I'm Just Saying

Dear Mark Zuckerburg,

You owe me big time. If you ever want to make it up to me, just send a nice check to my therapist. But I bet she doesn’t like you either. Because of you, every Monday, Thursday and Saturday from 3- 4:30 p.m., she has had to listen to me talk about how much I hate Facebook.

Don’t be too hard on yourself though. You had a really good idea, in your head. You just forgot to take some important variables into account.

  1. People think that others care about what they have to say.
  2. People don’t care about what others have to say.
  3. People think what they have to say is important to others.
  4. People could not care less about what is important to others.

However, it is not too late to save Facebook. Just take my advice, please I am begging you, and your website just might come back from MySpace level.

  1. The Dislike button- The like button only looks really successful because of the fact that there is no dislike button. Because only about 1 out of every 10 times do I actually like a status, and this does not account for the other 9 times that I do not like a status. (*The dislike button can also apply to relationship statuses)
  2. Take away people’s ability to say where they are and who they are with- Because, well, no one cares.
  3. Automatically make wall posts between couples private- As to avoid that awkward moment when you throw up your breakfast after seeing “Yay it’s our two day anniversary! I love you baby!”
  4. Automatic spell-check statuses- Sometimes I get confused when I see, “weekend wuz wy 2 fast dont wanna go 2 skwl tommrw.” Similarly, I almost forget what language I am supposed to be speaking when I see, “mE n D@RReLL b LighTin sHizz ^ in d@ cLUb.”
  5. Tell annoying girls to stop talking about their feelings and go PMS elsewhere- I have had enough of all this, “I’m tired of getting my heart broken by someone that never cared about me.” and “Guys need to know how to treat a lady right. Smh.” I have added up the figures, and by my calculations, there is a reason you are single.

I have re-read all of my key points, and I really do not think any of them are that unrealistic, so if you could make this happen for me, that would be nice. I feel like a lot of people could really benefit from these changes but mostly I feel like if you do this, I might be able to lean off of my anger management medication a bit.

Please and Thank You,

Meghan Poff

A&E

Creators clash over Facebook debacle

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By Amanda Millea

A&E Co-Editor

In a time before friend requests from strangers, before relationship statuses, before people knew what you were doing at every waking moment, there was an idea for a social network that would have all of these features, plus more. The question is who really came up with the idea for this social network? Mark Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg), a Harvard Undergrad and computer programming genius, claimed to have come up with a social networking site that allowed people all over the world to communicate.

At first, Zuckerberg started small, restricting the social network only to people who attended Harvard. This was where Zuckerberg’s first law suit came into play. The Winklevoss twins (Josh Pence and Armie Hammer) said that Zuckerberg had stolen their network idea, where anyone with a Harvard.edu email address could join. Naturally, the “Winklevii” decide to sue for ownership. Somewhere in the midst of his first law suit, Zuckerberg gets hit with law suit number two, provided by none other than his best friend, Eduardo Saverin (Andrew Garfield). Saverin was the one that provided the originally small company with the money it needed to expand. Saverin was supposed to be a cofounder of the company, originally known as “The Facebook,” but in the expansion process, Zuckerberg and Saverin’s ideas clashed. The clash began when Napster founder, Sean Parker (Justin Timberlake) started giving Zuckerberg advice Saverin didn’t necessarily agree with. Eventually, Parker practically pushed Saverin out of the company and off of Zuckerberg’s real life friend list.

This movie was different in the way that it depicted not only one view, but three—three perspectives and three completely different truths to a story everyone assumed to be one-sided. Screen writer Aaron Sorkin adapted the screen play from Ben Mezrich’s book The Accidental Billionaires. Sorkin did an excellent job leaving most of this story to the imagination. The different perspectives leave the mind wondering where the truth lies, and will have people talking, even after the movie ends.

“The Social Network” takes a deeper look into the social networking world most teens visit on a daily basis. After the movie, the first thing I did was get on my Facebook. The movie opened my eyes to how truly addictive Facebook is. The movie itself proved to be equally addictive. Although it seemed long at times, the audience is immediately invested in the plot of the film. When the movie was over, I had mixed feelings about the actual ending. I was glad it was over because it was a rather long film, but the plot still seemed like it had so much more to it. By the end, my opinion on who had invented Facebook had not changed. Facebook was created solely by Zuckerberg. Zuckerberg’s character says it best, “If you guys were the inventors of Facebook, you’d have invented Facebook.” If Zuckerberg was lying, all I have to say is well played, Zuckerberg. Well played.