Facebook Stalking 101

I assume most of you have Facebook. If you are one of the lucky few that managed to escape the Facebook madness, good for you! Seriously, I wish I had the willpower to cancel my account. I have tried on numerous occasions. And I was actually successful for about a month. But inevitably, I was back on "the book."

I remember when I first heard about Facebook. I signed up but still didn't really understand the full concept. Eventually it started catching on across campus and everyone starting hopping on the Facebook bandwagon. But it was really a college thing. You didn't have to worry about your siblings, parents, and even grandparents stalking your Facebook page. Now everyone has a Facebook account. Parents, cousins, bosses, co-workers. You have to be really careful about what you post, what photos you share, any status updates you put up. I think it has lost some of it's charm. Before you could share witty comments, hysterical photos, inside jokes.... but now everyone reads into what you write and what other people post. People judge others by their Facebook accounts. And honestly, 90% of the time... most people don't understand the meaning of the inside joke or funny comment that is posted but they make judgements anyway..... Quite frankly, I miss the old Facebook.

I mean sure it is a great way to reconnect with old friends and with your family members that live far away. But now rather then sending cards, we post on each other's walls. Who makes phone calls anymore? Everything is much less personal!

And then comes my BIGGEST PET PEEVE. When those folks that were never nice to you, sometimes actually mean to you, decide to add you as a friend on Facebook. If you are not my friend, and you have never been my friend, then why on earth are you adding me as a friend on Facebook? Because what happens is I have to decide whether or not to add them and if I decide not to add them then I look like the jerk. So you add them. And then you have to wonder... "Are they Facebook stalking me? Should I make a limited profile list?"

Let's talk a little bit about Facebook stalking. Did you know people actually make up fake accounts, using fake names, so they can add people that they don't like and look at their photos and profiles? Yep, crazy! I know one of these stalker types. And she even made fake Twitter name to follow certain people's Twitter accounts without their knowledge. So folks, the lesson here... set your privacy settings and don't add people you don't know.

Here is the Urban Dictionary's definition of a Facebook stalker:

Someone who is obsessed with someone else and stalks them on facebook. Not always traceable or noticeable, but clues are: wall posts replying to every status update, viewing every posted picture of the stalked, etc...

You are a FB stalker. You qualify as a FB stalker if you :

a) click on someone's profile more than once a day even if they haven't messaged or tagged you in a photo. 


b) have dragged and dropped more than 3 FB photos (not from your own profile) 


c) actually go to a place mentioned on someone's page in hopes of seeing them in real life...creepy!

And something that upsets me even more is when they add my husband! Now you have never met my hubby. We haven't seen each other is years. And when we did, we didn't like each other. So why on earth would you go to the trouble to add my husband on Facebook? The whole thing is kind of creepy to me. I prefer to maintain relationships with old friends.... not the folks that were mean and standoffish in high school and college. Once in awhile I will get a little naive and think to myself... "well maybe they have grown up and are actually nice girls now." So I will send them a nice message wishing them well. And then of course... no response.

So then comes the next question. Is it okay to de-friend people on Facebook? Awhile back I actually removed 2,000 people from my friend list. I hit 5,000 friends and at that point you are actually not allowed to add any more. So I decided to take away anyone that I didn't personally know. It took hours and during the process I somehow managed to de-friend real friends by accident. I actually gave up before I went through my entire friend list. But I felt better about knowing a good majority of the people left on my friend list. It was nice to actually recognize people on the newsfeed.

Personally, I think that you should friend people on Facebook because you are friends and you want to stay in touch with them. So if they aren't really your friends and you don't talk to them on Facebook, maybe it is perfectly fine to go ahead and "de-friend" them. If someone knows, please explain to me why people have a desire to get on other people's Facebook accounts that they don't like and go through their profile and photos? It is like a strange obsession. I think you should ignore the folks you don't like and spend your time enjoying your own life and your actual friends. I wonder how many minutes a day people waste looking at profiles of people that they dislike?

Now I will admit, I love looking at my friends profiles to see what they have been up to and to check out their photos from the weekend. But once again, that is because I actually like those people. I think there is a difference.

What do you think? De-friend or add all sorts of privacy settings and put them on your limited profile list?

What are your biggest Facebook pet peeves?